AR Forward Report
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!I NFORMAT ION T ECHNOLOGY I
Integrate IT systems across all state agencies to save taxpayer money and improve citizen experience
I STATE PURCHASES I
Centralize state procurement processes to save money for Arkansas taxpayers
Renegotiate statewide contracts for better pricing
I STATE VEHIC LES!
Sell old vehicles to lower maintenance costs and reduce fleet size,
Centralize vehicles to create efficiency
I STATE EMPLOYEES I
Implement Pay Plan proposal to help recruit and retain great employees
Centralize training and professional development to save money and grow employee skills
I STATE GOVERNMENT BUILDINGS I
Reduce state government's physical footprint to save taxpayer money
Create database of existing real estate to identify areas of cost savings
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October 9, 2024
ARKANSAS FORWARD: IT STRATEGIC PLAN
THE ARKANSAS FORWARD IMPERATIVE
Governor Sanders launched Arkansas Forward with the aspiration for the State of Arkansas to set the
standard for government efficiency and effectiveness through enterprise-wide operational change.
Achieving such an aspiration will include delivery of better state government services, at less cost, for all
Arkansans. To do so, state employees, teams, and departments will need to work together in new ways
and with new skills. Delivering Arkansas Forward’s potential, therefore, will require improving the state
government’s competitiveness and enterprise IT capabilities to fulfill departmental needs quickly and
efficiently.
For these reasons, Governor Sanders has called for a redesign of Arkansas state government’s approach to
IT focused on modernizing delivery of state services in pursuit of operating efficiency and speed,
cybersecurity, improved user experience, and greater value for taxpayer dollars. A new strategy centered
on partnership with department leaders to identify and fulfill department needs across the enterprise aims
to unlock immediate efficiency gains while also laying the foundation for modern IT infrastructure and
capabilities across the enterprise.
This memo:
● Provides a diagnostic overview of Arkansas’ current state of IT operations and opportunities
● Introduces the main elements of a “future state” for DIS driven by value, security, experience,
department alignment, and a portfolio approach to managing enterprise IT activities
● Highlights interventions and initiatives to capture savings as well as pathways to the future state
through a phased rollout plan and change management practices to ensure a successful transformation
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Arkansas has an opportunity to improve IT administration across the state to improve customer
experience for residents of the state, reduce cybersecurity risk, generate up to ~$130M in annual cost
savings and deliver on CIOs’ expressed need to modernize the state’s IT capabilities to better support
executive departments. Capturing this opportunity depends on the state’s ability to coordinate efforts
across the enterprise, build new capabilities, and make one-time financial investments (e.g., for
infrastructure modernization, project governance).
CIOs shared that the biggest challenges for the state are found in IT program management and
governance, managing technical debt of legacy systems, vendor procurement, and resiliency and
cybersecurity. Arkansas Forward created a consolidated view of IT spending across the state, revealing a
total annual IT spend of ~$680-700M. This annual expenditure positions Arkansas in the second quartile
relative to peer state spend. Arkansas’ IT spending today is particularly skewed toward applications over
infrastructure (Arkansas spends ~$150-170M more than peers on applications) with 80% of total spend on
vendors. In contrast, Arkansas spends only $6M on cybersecurity compared to ~$60M among peers.
Depending on the state’s level of coordination, capability-building, and financial investment, the state
could expect to capture between ~$65-$130M annual IT savings by taking actions including:
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● Reducing volume of work by retiring/consolidating apps (~$40-45M) and de-prioritizing projects
(~$5-10M) that may be less critical and/or duplicative
● Increasing IT resource efficiency through large IT program governance and management
improvement (up to $45M), app modernization to reduce legacy tech risks (see p15), and increased
enterprise offerings (up to $5M)
● Negotiating better prices from IT vendors through consolidated statewide procurement (~$20M-
25M)
● Building new capabilities such as enhanced statewide cybersecurity and data and analytics
capabilities (captured through cost avoidance and business value delivery, such as reducing fraud
through analytics)
After establishing foundational enterprise capabilities, including greater governance and coordination
across departments, DIS will continue to pursue opportunities to advance the state’s IT infrastructure and
analytics capabilities (e.g., generative AI applications, cloud migration) and partner with department
leaders to enable efficient, effective state operations through modern data and technology resources.
SUMMARY OF CURRENT STATEWIDE IT INFRASTRUCTURE, SYSTEMS, AND ORGANIZATIONAL
STRUCTURE
A. Fact base and feedback from IT and department leaders on the current state of IT capabilities
Arkansas’ existing IT infrastructure, capabilities, and operating model introduces inefficiencies in spend
and deficiencies in cybersecurity and end user experience. Arkansas Forward represents an opportunity to
capture significant IT efficiencies while also taking bold steps to coordinate IT applications across the
state and modernize IT infrastructure for improved interdepartmental and end user experience.
In 2023, Arkansas’ IT spend report calculated that the state manages ~$680-700M of IT spend, with a
greater relative concentration of spending on applications and relatively less on infrastructure, end user
services, and related capabilities. Compared to benchmarks of 19 other public and relevant private sector
organizations, Arkansas spends 40% more on applications and 65% less on infrastructure, including end
user services, data center and cloud capabilities, and cybersecurity. Arkansas Forward represents an
opportunity to increase the effectiveness of existing IT resources, including for improved user experience
and cybersecurity, while introducing greater visibility and management of the state’s portfolio of IT
applications to optimize spend.
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Exhibit 1
Department CIOs highlighted five main opportunities to improve efficiency and effectiveness of
Arkansas’ IT service delivery: optimizing spend, reducing tech debt, improving risk posture, enhancing
enterprise-wide services, and developing and retaining top talent. In particular, CIOs indicated an
opportunity to introduce clearer enterprise-wide standards and services to support infrastructure
hosting/management, disaster relief capabilities, cybersecurity standards, portfolio governance, and
procurement & vendor management. The state’s current compartmentalized model of IT service
management limits visibility into the broader portfolio of existing capabilities, assets, and needs across
departments, which constrains DIS’s ability to share best practices across departments and enforce
common standards, e.g., in security and procurement processes.
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Exhibit 2
B. Opportunities in Arkansas IT
Enabled by greater coordination, capability-building, and financial investment across the enterprise,
Arkansas Forward outlines a path for the state to capture ~$65-130M in annual IT savings across four
opportunity categories: reducing the volume of work, increasing the efficiency of IT resources, securing
better pricing, and building new capabilities. In pursuit of capturing efficiency opportunities and
establishing a foundation for ongoing enterprise IT modernization, DIS has developed a suite of
prioritized initiatives across 8 actions:
• Retire and consolidate applications
• De-prioritize non-critical projects
• Standardize & improve large IT programs governance & management
• Modernize legacy application portfolio
• Increase enterprise-wide standards and services
• Get better rates for IT services contracts
• Standardize and improve cybersecurity statewide
• Build data & analytics capabilities
DIS will also pursue additional initiatives (e.g., consolidating and standardizing the infrastructure used
across departments) to support the change management and operating model activities required to deliver
and sustain the future state vision for enterprise IT governance and adopt best-in-class enterprise IT
practices.
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October 9, 2024
Exhibit 3
Reduce volume of work
Arkansas IT departments are oversaturated with applications written in legacy languages and have
decades of data hosted on-premises. Almost half of departments have 20% more apps per user compared
to peer benchmarks and nearly half of Arkansas’ apps are hosted on end-of-life or on extended support
servers. By avoiding duplications in IT spend and significantly reducing maintenance spend, Arkansas
can free up budget for value-add development. Reducing the volume of work by retiring and
consolidating apps has the potential to save between ~$40-45M annually, with de-prioritizing projects
potentially saving an additional $5-10M annually.
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October 9, 2024
Exhibit 4
In addition, Arkansas’ project spend across executive departments is highly fragmented: ~85% of total
projects make up just ~9% ($45M) of total project spend, while just 18 projects make up 91% (~$430M)
of total project spend. DHS and Commerce’s project analysis categorized ~50-70% of the current project
pipeline as “high priority” due to regulatory, criticality, or timeline reasons, leaving ~30 to 50% of
projects available to de-prioritize or rationalize. This is roughly double the share of low-priority projects
in similar states where roughly ~15-20% of projects are able to be deprioritized.
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Exhibit 5
Increase efficiency of IT resources
Across Arkansas IT, there are many projects demanding resources, with limited prioritization to allocate
resources and limited project management to address roadblocks and manage budget/schedule overruns.
The limited statewide visibility into large project and contract spend across departments introduces
inefficiencies in project budgeting and management of the pipeline of planned and active IT projects (e.g.,
$300M for FY23 is tied to amendments). By standardizing IT program governance and management and
making one-time investments in modernizations, Arkansas can optimize value and reduce total cost of
ownership via portfolio governance (i.e., application and infrastructure), improved efficiency of business
processes, and decreased M&O costs year-over-year. This improvement in large IT program governance
and management has the potential to save up to $45M annually while reducing legacy tech risks, yielding
a positive return after 5-10 years with vigilant portfolio and project management. In addition, increasing
enterprise-wide standards and services has the potential to save up to $5M per year.
Arkansas’ large IT projects are distributed across departments, with limited formal project governance
processes linking DIS, department CIOs, and operating leaders to track results and overcome
implementation barriers. With greater visibility into project contract spend, DIS will consistently and
centrally track performance metrics, such as status, schedules, risks, and budget overages. Standardized
and improved governance has the potential to unlock 10-20% savings across the state (i.e., up to $45M in
savings per year) based on similar efforts in other organizations. Additional capabilities and capacity,
including dedicated CIO attention and project managers aligned to the largest projects, will likely be
required to manage IT projects. Based on the current pipeline of projects with annualized budgets >$1M,
DIS and department IT divisions would require $3.5M-4M in funding to staff dedicated project managers
overseen by a general portfolio manager.
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October 9, 2024
Exhibit 6
In addition, Arkansas’ legacy applications and infrastructure may introduce unnecessary costs and risks.
Nearly half of Arkansas’ apps are hosted on end-of-life or on extended support servers, introducing
potential business continuity risks, cybersecurity breach risks, reduced efficiency of business processes,
and increased M&O costs. As a part of this strategy, DIS will explore opportunities to upgrade the ~45%
of IT applications eligible for modernization to improve service delivery, reduce long-term operating
costs, and mitigate risks presented by continued use of legacy systems.
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October 9, 2024
Exhibit 7
Get better pricing
From a procurement perspective, Arkansas faces long approval cycle times for large orders, limited
resources to actively manage vendors within departments, missed opportunities to increase buying power
state-wide and reduce rates, and an unclear delineation of procurement responsibilities between the
central procurement function, OSP, and DIS. An analysis of DHS IE-BM contract’s workforce mix
showed Arkansas is spending 23% on management and overhead compared with the 10% benchmark. In
addition, DHS IE-BM contract’s rate cards showed Arkansas is paying about 10% more than the typical
GSA rate on average. By improving pricing for IT service contracts, Arkansas can provide high-quality
enterprise-wide offerings and standards to free up department resources for department specific needs and
provide a faster and easier employee experience. As seen in Exhibit 8, the analysis of 2 procurement
optimization levers (i.e., aligning labor rates with market rates and optimizing workforce mix) on the
$250M DHS IE – BM contract revealed Arkansas has the potential to save at least 10-15% of current
costs. IT contracts not assessed as part of the procurement stream total to ~$210M, for which the potential
annual savings opportunity would be approximately $20-25M.
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Exhibit 8
Build new capabilities
Arkansas has limited state-wide standards for cybersecurity across its departments and needs greater
disaster recovery capabilities. Compared to peer states, Arkansas spends about $50M less annually on
cybersecurity and during interviews, nearly all CIOs mentioned the need for improved cybersecurity
capabilities. In addition, the state has high levels of attrition from retirement and private industry, and
typically cannot match salary for positions in the private sector, especially for technology roles. By
building new capabilities, such as investing state-wide in cybersecurity and data analytics talent, Arkansas
can drive program effectiveness and efficiency across all departments. This can also serve to improve
employee and citizen digital experiences, and standardize and improve cybersecurity state-wide.
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Exhibit 9
FUTURE STATE VISION FOR IT ORGANIZATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE
A. Guiding design principles for defining the future state
The target “future state” for state IT capabilities is centered on five fundamental design principles, which
represent the strategic priorities of Arkansas state government. Each IT initiative is intended to improve
Arkansas’ IT operations with respect to one or more of these design principles: value, security,
experience, department-alignment, and adoption of a portfolio approach.
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Exhibit 10
Value
DIS will focus on realizing value from state IT investments across the enterprise, including through scale
benefits from common procurement standards and gains in operating efficiency made possible by greater
visibility and coordination of projects and applications across the enterprise.
Security
The future IT operating model will enable development of integrated, enterprise-wide cybersecurity
standards, as well as capabilities within DIS and departments to enforce modern risk management
practices and promote resiliency against potential cyber risks that may result in data breaches or impede
state operations.
Experience
DIS will develop, and support departments in developing, positive digital experiences for state employees
and Arkansans, with a focus on ease-of-use, reliability, and clear communication channels for
troubleshooting. Clearly defined roles, responsibilities, and governance between DIS and departments
will further facilitate positive IT engagement experiences.
Department Aligned
DIS will partner with department leaders to best support (and understand) the strategic and operational
priorities of each department. IT engagements will complement and advance strategic objectives
determined by each department, with DIS available as a proactive thought partner, enabler, and source of
expertise for department leaders and department CIOs.
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Portfolio-Approach
DIS will develop an integrated, enterprise-wide view of state IT assets to identify and pursue
opportunities for efficiency and cross-pollinate best practices across departments. By developing and
managing a holistic perspective of enterprise IT activity and proposals, DIS will be able to align state IT
resources to their highest-value use case.
B. Delivering the Arkansas IT strategy: Best-practice operating model and aligned organization
Arkansas will draw on best practices from IT organizations in peer states and the private sector to inform
the future state IT organization and operating model design. In particular, organizations that pursue
integrated IT operating models1 often realize greater process efficiencies through the elimination of
redundant activities, with faster delivery of products and services to end users. Under an integrated IT
operating model, Arkansas department IT teams will operate under one combined collaboration model
with DIS. DIS will act as the application and infrastructure broker and will own the common IT resources
and functions (e.g., infrastructure, architecture, cybersecurity). Departments will own application
management and database administration, both of which will be governed by DIS, and DIS and
department CIOs will collaborate in the form of a central governing committee to set project management
standards and strategic goals for statewide IT organization.
To better enable departments to deliver on their missions with technology, DIS will pursue eight best
practices emblematic of best-in-class integrated IT operating models:
• Business-backed technology strategy: DIS will outline a business-backed technology strategy,
with clear value-at-stake, to identify technology investments that improve productivity, manage
inherent risk and drive ROI
• Modern organization and operating model: Centralized IT activities will be organized into
infrastructure service clusters, and DIS COE teams will be held accountable for business and
technology outcomes through SLAs.
• Engineering excellence: DIS will create cross-functional teams with clear, accountable roles and
hands-on governance. The teams will be empowered to make fast, autonomous decisions and will
embrace agile ways of working by breaking projects into phases and emphasizing continuous
collaboration and improvement.
• Talent, partnerships, and capabilities: DIS will build internal talent and will foster a culture of
talent attraction and reskilling. The centralized IT function will harness adaptable, outcome-based
technology partnerships with departments and source external IT support and expertise when
needed.
• Platform-oriented architecture: DIS will employ modular, API-driven (i.e., application
programming interface-driven) architecture to promote innovation and renewal of the core tech
stack, implement next-gen capabilities, and reduce tech debt.
1
An integrated IT operated model refers to an operating model in which there is one operating model and one view
of how technology capabilities are delivered by both digital and conventional IT groups. Under this combined
model, IT teams organize around technology capabilities (e.g., applications, infrastructure, expert services) rather
than specific technology assets and functions, and they often use a project management approach that involves
breaking the project into small phases called “sprints” to speed up the provision of IT services.
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• Infrastructure including cloud: DIS will migrate and manage its core infrastructure and
architecture to the cloud.
• Data capabilities: DIS will develop data capabilities and unlock insights driven by data
pipelines, real time events, and external data. It will look to adopt advanced analytics tools (e.g.,
machine learning, artificial intelligence) where possible, own database administration, and set
enterprise data governance standards. It will also promote the use of the AR data hub across the
state.
• Cybersecurity: DIS will also build robust cybersecurity capabilities so Arkansas can grow and
transform with speed, security, and scale. Cybersecurity will be integrated into statewide
enterprise and governance processes to equip DIS to respond to cyber threats in real time.
See Appendix 2A for more information on how to execute across the eight technology best practices.
Success of a renewed integrated IT operating model depends on strong cultural alignment, talent
capability, and extensive partnership between DIS and departments. As DIS and department IT
departments begin to transform, DIS and partners will improve the odds of a successful, sustainable
transformation by managing talent and cultural change management, strengthening department
partnerships, and defining and monitoring business value enabled by IT and technology services.
• DIS will manage talent and culture modernization with the same rigor as technology
modernization. Talent- and culture-related issues stand out as top challenges for IT organizations
and highlight a critical need for retraining, but few technology organizations undertake talent
transformations. To begin, Arkansas will take inventory of the skills employees possess and
compare the results with the technology skills the company will need to attain its goals.
Understanding the gaps can help DIS direct talent-development efforts to where they will be most
useful.
• DIS leadership will develop new, collaborative processes and structures, including a cross-
departmental governance board, to strengthen relationships with department IT teams and lay a
foundation for ongoing partnership. DIS will increase its alignment with departments not only by
including CIOs in strategy discussions but also by bringing employees from DIS and other
departmental functions together on cross-functional teams that are jointly responsible for delivery
of new projects.
• DIS project managers will measure the business value created with IT and share it broadly. IT-
performance measurement often focuses on cost and risk, rather than value generation. As the
new operating model begins to unfold and value is captured through IT initiatives, DIS will
ensure it measures and shares improvements with CIOs across the State. Frequently measuring,
reporting, and reviewing IT performance in joint DIS and CIO IT Governance Committee
meetings (see next section) will also help the organization to highlight and pressure-test the value
created by IT teams and revise the IT organization’s strategy as needed.
• DIS performance will be monitored by departments and the IT Governance Committee through
SLAs. Service Level Agreements will be established between DIS teams and departments to track
DIS solution delivery against timelines, budgets, and scope. The use of SLAs will encourage
partnership and alignment between DIS and departments, and DIS’s adherence to service levels
will gradually establish DIS’s role as a trusted, central source of expertise.
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C. Defining the future state
Future IT operations for the state of Arkansas will not only protect the resource and security interests of
the state, but also lay the foundation for best-in-class technology and information management providing
departments with greater access to the requisite capabilities, assets, and expertise to deliver on their
missions for Arkansans. DIS will establish an enterprise governance model to provide greater centralized
visibility into the state’s application portfolio and IT infrastructure, in which DIS serves as a broker,
providing certain services (e.g., desktop services) and establishing common standards (e.g. cybersecurity)
across departments while preserving autonomy and opportunity for innovation within and among
departments.
Exhibit 11
In particular, DIS will assume greater governance and oversight of select IT infrastructure, application
management and enterprise-wise services, detailed below, and partner with department CIOs and
operating leaders to further refine the degree of centralized IT shared services that best advances
department priorities. As DIS expands its governance role across select IT activities, the DIS approach
will continue to be one of partnership with and service to state departments. Early efforts for the shared
services model will begin with rollout of the centralized cybersecurity function. To be considered
compliant with statewide cybersecurity standards, departments will be required to comply with enterprise
security standards, as well as utilize other centralized functions like disaster recovery services and storage
and backup services.
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Exhibit 12
To more effectively link technology resources to department needs, Arkansas’ IT services teams will
evolve into an integrated IT organization. Arkansas will focus on three key actions, informed by case
studies of exemplary IT organizations, to develop the requisite structure, processes, and capabilities to
serve departments and their beneficiaries:
• Establishing a deeper enterprise partnership between DIS and departments
• Creating a governance structure to keep the IT organization focused on the state’s strategic
priorities, and
• Establishing a rigorous system for prioritizing and delivering IT projects
Establishing a deeper enterprise partnership between DIS and departments
Under the new operating model, DIS will act as an integrated digital and technology unit that advises
departments on application dependencies and owns the state’s core infrastructure. Applications refer to the
technology-enabled offerings used by departments and DIS. Their immediate and primary purpose is to
enable departments to perform activities that create value, in line with the department’s objectives.
Infrastructure includes the back-end technology capabilities that power applications and the state more
broadly (e.g., end user services, data center services, network services, voice services, cloud services,
storage and backup services, disaster recovery services). The central IT function will focus on creating
and improving infrastructure through the formation of agile COEs, advising departments on application
dependencies, providing expertise and capabilities (e.g. cybersecurity, data and analytics), and working
closely with department CIOs in the form of the IT Governance Committee to define project management
standards.
In accordance with one of its primary responsibilities, DIS will act as an infrastructure services team,
where it will be responsible for provisioning and managing the underlying technology infrastructure in
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ways that make it efficient, easy to use, reliable, and consistent. By automating activities and promoting
standards development, operations, and engineering practices across departments, DIS will continuously
streamline its work and that of the wider organization.
Departments will retain specialized application development and maintenance teams while utilizing DIS
solutions to departmental-specific use cases where appropriate. DIS will advise departments on available
solutions, handle specialized application procurement requests, navigate application dependencies
between departments according to departmental roadmaps, and work to make improvements to the
statewide application portfolio as needed.
Creating a governance structure to keep the IT organization focused on strategic priorities
DIS will also act as a central delivery office that performs coordinating functions for the IT organization
(e.g., cybersecurity, data and analytical capabilities, performance tracking, and governance). Within this
collection of responsibilities, DIS will partner with the IT Governance Committee to hold departments
and internal DIS team accountable through a series of actions, including:
• Defining value-focused performance metrics: Defining performance metrics for the IT
organization will help DIS and the IT Governance Committee stay informed on whether projects
and developing teams are on track. Such metrics should measure both value creation in DIS (“Is
the effort creating expected value in operational savings, resident experience or employee
experience?”) and the delivery of work (“Is the team meeting its commitments?”). See Appendix
5D and Section 3 for more detail on metrics.
• Creating processes for tracking and reporting: DIS should have consistent workflows for
collecting performance updates from departments and internal DIS teams (with particular interest
in whether value and other targets are being met and whether any interdependencies are causing
delays) and synthesizing those into reports that can inform the IT Governance Committee’s
strategic decisions.
• Establishing a mechanism for intervening to prevent or resolve challenges impeding project
success: Since unexpected difficulties can slow down work on technology projects, DIS can
implement solutions to minimize project delays and implement an escalation mechanism to
surface conflicts to the IT Governance Committee, which resolves them.
Establishing a rigorous system for prioritizing and delivering IT projects
Coordinating and prioritizing IT projects and funding requirements across a statewide enterprise can be
difficult due to the many stakeholders, competing projects, and limited funding available. As such, DIS
can partner with a cross-departmental IT Governance Committee to maintain order in how DIS and
departments respond to the statewide demand for technology services. The IT Governance Committee
will be comprised of DIS leaders and department CIOs and will coordinate project delivery based on
department needs and enterprise goals. The Committee will set the overall strategic direction for the IT
organization and allocate funding to projects based on the State’s strategic objectives and needs.
Each CIO will act as a departmental representative and will be responsible for understanding and
communicating the department’s priorities to the larger committee. The Committee will hold regular
meetings to review the value and feasibility of the proposed projects, identify interdependencies, and
negotiate departments’ competing interests. DIS will then work with the CIOs to balance project priorities
and resource requirements and coordinate any overlapping or related activities, particularly when it comes
to prioritizing infrastructure changes. While reviewing and prioritizing departmental project requests, the
Committee will also review opportunities to modernize IT applications and infrastructure. Modernizing
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core systems ensures that infrastructures services remain capable of meeting increasingly sophisticated
technical requirements from departments and application teams.
Moving to an integrated technology operating model will require significant change management
activities and potential talent considerations (e.g., reskill existing employees, hiring additional talent,
shifting capacity into DIS, etc.). See Section 3 for more information on change management activities and
organizational considerations.
Exhibit 13
D. Prioritized initiatives
Arkansas has the potential to capture up to $130M in annual IT savings across four IT value levers by
implementing 34 near term and long-term initiatives aimed at modernizing Arkansas’ IT applications,
infrastructure, cybersecurity, and data analytics capabilities as well as its program governance structure.
Initiatives have been refined with input from state leadership, including Chief Information Officers across
state departments, and are divided into four categories: (1) Reducing the volume of work, (2) Increasing
efficiency of IT resources, (3) Getting better pricing, and (4) Building cybersecurity and data analytics
capabilities.
Opportunity Category Description Total
Initiatives
Summary Develop an integrated shared services model centered around n/a
DIS as a centralized IT service and governance provider
Reducing volume of work Retire and consolidate applications to reduce maintenance 9
costs, freeing up budget for value-added development.
Increasing efficiency of IT Robust IT governance and management processes enable teams 14
resources to prioritize projects and allocate resources effectively,
modernizing IT infrastructure to optimize value and total cost
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of ownership while adhering to best practice project
management.
Getting better pricing High-quality enterprise-wide offerings and standards free up 2
department resources for department-specific needs and enable
a faster and easier employee experience.
Building cybersecurity Match or exceed peer state spending on cybersecurity and 9
and data analytics focus on recruiting and retaining top data analytics talent to
capabilities enhance the state's IT infrastructure and departmental services.
Change management Implement a series of processes and strategies aimed at n/a
nurturing understanding & conviction, reinforcing change,
instilling confidence and building skills, and role modeling
behaviors to encourage uptake and sustain the impact of
Arkansas Forward IT imperative
This implementation of these 34 initiatives will unlock and sustain ongoing efficiency opportunities for
the state and will help Arkansas to realize its future state vision across the four value capture opportunities
mentioned above:
Reducing volume of work: In the future, applications will be retired and consolidated where possible
and application maintenance spend will be significantly reduced to free up budget and improve the
baseline for value-add development.
Increasing IT resource efficiency: With robust IT governance and management processes in place,
teams will understand how to prioritize projects and allocate resources adequately across project types.
Such an approach will involve embracing total cost of ownership (TCO) enabled by portfolio governance
(i.e., application and infrastructure) and delivering programs consistently with best practice project
management methods. Arkansas will also look to optimize value by modernizing its IT infrastructure
through migrating its core infrastructure and architecture to the cloud, retiring legacy systems, and
reducing its data center footprint.
Get better pricing: High-quality enterprise-wide offerings and standards will free up department
resources for department-specific needs and enable a faster and easier employee experience.
Build new capabilities: Arkansas will meet or exceeds peer state spending on cybersecurity, creating a
low risk of cyber events and significantly reducing near misses. This approach will also emphasize
recruiting and retaining top data analytics talent and capabilities, spreading high quality talent throughout
the state’s IT infrastructure to better serve department needs.
The table below outlines the vision for Arkansas’ IT organization across each opportunity category:
Summary
Capability From… To…
Operating Decentralized operations leading to Shared services and/or central governance
model redundancies (e.g. apps, infrastructure), model oriented around value and portfolio
inefficient IT spending and procurement, and governance (i.e. application and
limited cyber and analytics capabilities infrastructure) where central IT provides
certain services (such as infrastructure) and
standards for other departments to follow (e.g.
cybersecurity, user experience, vendors and
their rate cards for app build/testing)
Reduce volume of work
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Capability From… To…
Application Oversaturation of applications with ~50% of Applications are retired and consolidated
Consolidation departments having 20%+ more apps-per-user where possible; maintenance spend
compared to peer benchmarks significantly reduced to free up budget for
value-add development; development
protocols established to mitigate application
proliferation
Tech debt and Accumulation of decades of data & App maintenance spend significantly reduced
maintenance applications written in legacy languages / to free up budget for value-add development;
spend hosted on-premises, unsuccessful efforts to improved baseline for new development and
rationalize applications across departments balanced departments meeting peer states’
volume of work
Increase IT resource efficiency
Capability From… To…
IT governance Limited IT governance to manage large Robust IT governance and management
and project volume and resource allocation; few processes in place; teams understand how to
management prioritization processes in place to allocate prioritize projects and allocate resources
resources to highest value-add projects adequately across project types
Legacy Outdated application portfolio with nearly Modernized IT infrastructure that optimizes
application ~45% of apps hosted on end-of-life or value and TCO according to portfolio
portfolio extended support servers governance (i.e., application and
infrastructure)
Standards and Limited project management standards to Consistent and disciplined program delivery
services address roadblocks and manage with best practice project management
budget/schedule overruns
Get better pricing
Capability From… To…
IT service Long approval cycle times for large orders, High-quality enterprise-wide offerings and
contracts limited resources to actively manage vendors standards to free up Dept. resources for Dept-
within departments, and missed opportunity to specific needs and faster and easier employee
increase buying power and reduce rates experience
Build new capabilities
Capability From… To…
Statewide Trails peers on cybersecurity spend (i.e., Arkansas establishes enterprise cybersecurity
cybersecurity spends ~$50M annually less on protocols and meets investment needs in
cybersecurity), lacking enterprise approach to cybersecurity to create conditions for low risk
cyber risk of cyber events and significantly reduced near
misses
Data and Limited data analytics capabilities relative to Departments recruit and retain top data
analytics peer states and high attrition to private sector analytics talent; capabilities are spread
capabilities throughout Arkansas IT infrastructure; AR
data hub is utilized statewide
IT Orientation Focus on delivering applications and Understanding department needs and adopting
infrastructure a service orientation to meet them
Change management
Capability From… To…
Department Limited alignment between department needs IT is a trusted organization across state
and IT and IT strategy and policies departments; department needs inform IT
alignment projects, and IT enables efficient and effective
processes across departments
Collaboration IT teams work predominantly within IT regularly works with others on cross-
departments departmental working teams
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Vision Stakeholders do not know about or understand Stakeholders understand the potential impact
Arkansas Forward and are excited for the future
Adaptability Teams are comfortable with legacy ways of IT is excited about new approaches and
working and aren’t motived to change methods and regularly communicates about
what does and does not work
The 34 initiatives identified during Wave 1 have also been prioritized according to expected annual
impact, feasibility to execute, and timeline to implementation and are grouped into categories by
opportunity-type. Initiatives that are easy to execute, or “familiar”, to the IT organization, are considered
quick wins and have been mapped to a near-term implementation horizon. Similarly, initiatives that
require additional support or more time to execute have been mapped to medium-term or long-term
horizons, depending on their level of complexity and pathway to execution. Appendix 4 contains more
information on how the initiatives were prioritized and mapped across horizons.
The table below outlines the IT initiatives that were identified during Wave 1 of Arkansas Forward. The
list contains the initiative name and tracking number, and the initiatives have been grouped by
opportunity category. The initiatives, which link to the master initiative file and TSG initiative charters,
are mapped to owners across TSS, DFA, DHS, and ADE and are managed under the Arkansas Forward
project management organization’s regular weekly and monthly meetings. The following pages of the
document outline the pathways to implementation for these initiatives and the potential change
management and enablement activities that may be actioned to capture value across the procurement
organization. See Appendix 4, and the Master Initiative List for more detail on the initiatives.
Opportunity Number Priority Initiative
Category
Reducing ADE-9 High Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business critical/duplicative
volume of work applications across all departments
5 High Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business critical/duplicative
applications across all divisions of Commerce
ADE-3 Medium Leverage AI to automate the first review of the AR App
ADE-29 Medium Coordinate assessment and de-prioritization of non-critical or non-urgent current
and upcoming IT projects
TSS-28 Medium Evaluate relationship with INA
TSS-40 Medium Coordinate assessment and de-prioritization of non-critical or non-urgent current
and upcoming projects in all departments
DFA-28 Medium Coordinate assessment and de-prioritization of non-critical or non-urgent current
and upcoming IT projects
DHS- Low De-prioritize noncritical IT projects
1000
26 Low Coordinate assessment and de-prioritization of non-critical or non-urgent current
and upcoming IT projects
Increase TSS-30 High Create an IT procurement center of excellence
efficiency of IT
resources TSS-36 High Establish a statewide data hub
TSS-39 High Deploy Arkansan- and employee-facing platforms to leverage statewide
data hub
FUNC- High Standardize and improve large IT program governance and management
73
7 High Develop an internal IT shared services team to provide improved support and
unified standards
ADE-11 Medium Migrate to common IT platforms across divisions
TSS-31 Medium Create a cybersecurity center of excellence
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FUNC- Medium Deploy a central IT applications catalog
90
TSS-38 Medium Deploy LAUNCH program
FUNC- Medium Consolidate department servers into DIS datacenter
74
FUNC- Low Modernize legacy application portfolio to reduce tech debt
72
15 Low Finalize UI Mod & cut expenses with DIS
18 Low Collaborate with NASAA to ease administrative burdens on issues
DHS 113 DHS Coach other departments and DIS based on DHS IT excellence
ongoing
Get better FUNC- Medium Build large IT project vendor management and procurement capabilities within DIS
pricing 76
FUNC- Low Conduct “quick wins” analysis to identify and capture value in upcoming
75 procurements
Build new DFA-45 High Assess opportunity for implementing data-driven audits
capabilities ADE-23 Medium Offer Data as a Service (DaaS)
FUNC- Medium Implement cybersecurity quick wins
77
FUNC- Medium Standardize and improve cybersecurity Statewide
78
FUNC- Medium Identify and prioritize the top 2-3 analytics use cases across the enterprise and
79 launch those use cases
DFA-29 Medium Evaluate software to detect tax evasion
DFA-30 Medium Improve information sharing across departments
6 Low Identify fraud and abuse through detection software
16 Low Improve lead identification and conversion
IMPLEMENTATION AND CHANGE MANAGEMENT PLAN
A. Pathways to future state
DIS and executive departments will progress towards the future state IT operating model across three
horizons: “Prepare and Launch”, “Scale”, and “Continuously Improve.” Within each horizon, DIS will
lead a suite of projects – summarized in Appendix 5A. Each horizon is characterized by a period of time
and by the maturity of the state IT operating model across three dimensions:
• Opportunities for efficiency and value: DIS will pursue activities, particularly in Horizon 1,
focused on capturing IT savings across four high-opportunity levers, i.e., the volume of IT work,
increasing IT resource efficiency, negotiating better prices, and building new IT capabilities.
• Governance: Across horizons, DIS will design, establish, and iterate on an integrated operating
model, including structure for inter-departmental cooperation and mechanisms for accountability
(e.g., roles and responsibilities, portfolio management, prioritization criteria, cybersecurity
standards, and data administration).
• Services: As DIS demonstrates the proof-of-concept of the new model through early pilots of
central services (e.g., end user services) and maintaining satisfactory service levels for
department partners, DIS’s service remit will expand across horizons, including, for example,
data center services, network, voice, cloud, storage and backup, and disaster recovery services,
thus freeing department IT teams to focus on critical mission-delivery activities.
Opportunities for efficiency and value
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Three transformation “horizons” act as guideposts to track and manage initiative progress towards the
target IT future state. Exhibit 14 summarizes initiatives by opportunity type and horizon, including:
Horizon 1: Prepare and Launch. The “Prepare and Launch” phase reflects the first 12 months of
implementation. In this phase, DIS will lay the foundations for its transformation by developing a robust
understanding of department strategic goals and the technology changes needed to deliver on them,
identifying key IT dependencies, and outlining aggressive, but manageable transformation timelines.
Horizon 2: Scale. The “Scale” phase reflects the next 18 months of implementation. In this phase of
work, DIS will build a flexible, fast technology delivery model using agile methods to prioritize and carry
out activities with the greatest potential to realize performance and savings gains.
Horizon 3: Continuously Improve. The “Continuously Improve” phase reflects implementation 30+
months into the future and focuses on continuous improvement. During this phase, IT will continue to
pilot programs and periodically renew core systems to support digital functionalities. Additionally, DIS
will build flexible architecture around platforms and products to serve departments and will integrate data
and analytics systems and security and privacy protections into solutions as they are developed.
Exhibit 14
Governance and Services
By incorporating activities beyond the “opportunities for efficiency and value” initiative-based activities,
Arkansas will create a new, integrated operating model and shared services approach that generates long-
lasting value in the IT organization, beyond dollar efficiency improvements. Governance and service-
related activities will help DIS acquire central visibility into application value across departments, avoid
duplicative investments, and coordinate related procurement activities, as well as enable DIS to establish
statewide cybersecurity standards and modernize applications. Additionally, DIS will be able to monitor
funding/resource requirements and project status, and reallocating resources to highest-impact use cases,
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and intervening to help progress projects along key milestones. In order to align service goals to
department priorities, DIS services will be supported by agreed-upon SLAs, performance management
KPIs, and a funding model that both supports expanded DIS capabilities and ensures those capabilities are
accessible to departments.
Changes in governance and services will require additional capacity and capabilities internally. As DIS
takes a more prominent role in governance and begins to deliver more services centrally, it may consider
additional funding approaches. Among the options are (1) cost recovery or chargebacks to departments
receiving DIS services, (2) direct appropriations, and (3) establishment of a central technology fund that
allows for year-to-year rollover of funds. These mechanisms serve different purposes and should be used
fit for purpose. For example, cost recovery and chargebacks are best for services that are provided to
departments that have a defined scope and/or volume (e.g., desktop services, network services, voice
services). Direct appropriations to DIS are most appropriate to fund capabilities that are not directly
related to specific services, but instead are capabilities important for the state to sustain (e.g., central
oversight and governance of the IT infrastructure and application portfolio). In some cases, states have
established a technology fund that has the ability to rollover unused funds year-to-year. This funding
mechanism is helpful to allow for a multi-year modernization mindset and buttress DIS application
portfolio management efforts. See Appendix 3 for more considerations on future-state funding
approaches.
Exhibit 15
B. Sequencing of initiatives and key performance metrics
To realize future state outcomes, Arkansas can organize its 34 IT initiatives and supporting
implementation activities into a comprehensive phasing plan. The plan, outlined in Exhibit 16, organizes
initiative-based activities across three phases, spanning over the next 30+ months. The phased approach
allows Arkansas Forward to build capacity and capability to deliver in the new operating model, build
trust as service levels are established and met and identify opportunities for additional technology and
information-enabled value creation within the state.
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Exhibit 16
As initiatives progress, DIS and the inter-departmental governance board will monitor progress toward
both value capture (i.e., estimated savings realized) and organizational goals. DIS will establish metrics
for evaluating progress toward transformation goals according to the following dimensions: “run”
metrics, which evaluate the efficiency and quality of existing operations and systems, “grow” metrics,
which are linked to strategic initiatives, and “health” metrics, that assess forward-looking metrics related
to talent and user experience.
Run: Run metrics are required to keep existing products and services running and may include measures
of efficiency of current systems and operations, quality of current systems and operations, and operational
risk.
Grow: Grow metrics are linked to transformation initiatives and may include measures of productivity
(e.g., costs per developer hour), quality (e.g., number of priority 1 defects), project management (e.g.,
schedule accuracy, cost accuracy, budget, number of projects by estimated spend quartile), and level of
innovation (e.g., time to deployment, expected revenue/cost impact).
Health: Health metrics are to be agreed upon and evaluated with inter-departmental IT leaders and may
include organizational health figures (e.g., retention, number of open positions, employee satisfaction
survey results) and technological health statistics (e.g., obsolescence).
Appendix 5D contains additional run, grow, and health metrics.
C. Change management horizons
Realizing the opportunity of Arkansas Forward requires mindset shifts in the way IT professionals and
department operators view and interact with DIS. To encourage uptake and sustain the impact of
Arkansas Forward IT initiative, DIS will implement a series of change management practices aimed at
nurturing understanding and conviction, reinforcing change, instilling confidence and building skills, and
role modeling behaviors aligned to the DIS future state.
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Exhibit 17
• Understanding and conviction: Department leaders will employ a series of communication
mechanisms to inspire understanding and conviction for the Arkansas Forward imperative and
keep IT professionals informed on key policy and process changes. For example, DIS leaders can
help departments understand the benefits of proactive partnership with departments by
showcasing projected savings and lower volume of ad-hoc support requests.
• Reinforcement with formal mechanisms: DIS leaders will also implement formal mechanisms to
track implementation progress and reinforce behavior, mindset, and process shifts. Mechanisms
may include dedicated impact tracking of implementation progress, routine implementation
progress dialogues (e.g., through surveys, progress updates), award and recognition programs for
exemplary initiative owners, and feedback mechanisms to refine current procurement initiatives
and identify new initiatives.
• Confidence and skill building: DIS leaders will inspire confidence and competency among IT
professionals through support of experienced-based training pathways. DIS will also improve the
training and support for those who work alongside the procurement workforce through online
repositories of best-practice contract documents and designation of clear points of contact for
more complex procurement questions.
• Role modeling: Department leaders will also implement a series of role modeling activities to
drive cultural change. Activities may include highly visible demonstrations of partnership
between DIS and department leaders to prioritize key projects, and informal “pulse checks” with
employees and change champions to listen, coach, role model, and explain change.
Additional examples of change management activities are listed in Appendix 5F.
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D. Implications for IT-related processes
While implementing initiatives, Arkansas will need to monitor interdependencies between the IT
organization, other domains within the Transformation and Shared Services department (e.g.,
Procurement, Fleet, Real Estate), and other State of Arkansas departments and proactively mitigate
disruptions.
Based on conversations with DIS, governance is among the highest priority interdependencies, affecting
all departments and stemming from IT. To mitigate disruptions, governance can be divided into two
components:
• Project/program management governance: Programs can be run robustly and consistently through
program governance best practices, including developing a governance structure, standardizing
business processes, and proactively managing events and risk. Refer to Appendix 5C for more
information on project management best practices.
• Shared service governance: At present, Arkansas IT is characterized by a decentralized IT
approach, limited IT governance, and few prioritization processes, leading to redundancies in
apps and infrastructure. Using shared services best practices, IT would be organized around a
central governance model oriented around value and portfolio governance, with robust processes
to allocate resources and prioritize projects. Refer to Appendix 5C for more information on IT
governance best practices.
Additional interdependencies also exist across the IT organization, including:
• Managing cross-functional initiatives: Several IT initiatives are owned by departments other than
DIS (e.g., DFA, DHS, DFA,) and will require cross-departmental and cross-functional
collaboration. For example, initiative FUNC-74 pertains to consolidating department servers into
a DIS data center and will require close coordination with department IT teams.
• Allocating cost savings from Wave 1 initiative efficiencies to shared services operating model
shift: The initiatives identified in Wave 1 of Arkansas Forward will result in dollar efficiencies
savings that can be used to implement the new Arkansas operating model, build cybersecurity
capabilities, and centralize infrastructure services.
• Building trust between departments and DIS: DIS is not currently viewed as a central source of IT
excellence and expertise. As such, DIS authority and shared services buy-in will need to increase
through the tracking of DIS performance relative to agreed-upon SLAs, frequent cross-functional
meetings with departments to review and refine governance policies, and proven success of
centralized IT service delivery.
• Shifting operating model and capacity needs: Currently, ~352 IT professionals across the state
support infrastructure, application management, and end user services. Of this number, ~186
FTEs are located within DIS. To manage increased responsibilities in DIS, existing IT
professionals within departments focused on similar infrastructure and general end user services
may be moved or consolidated into DIS support teams.
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• Structural operating model changes: Arkansas’ new integrated operating model may also require
structural changes to the central IT organization (e.g., reporting structures, team organizations).
Other state IT organizations, for example, incentivize and role-model certain behaviors or
capabilities through dedicated representation on the IT leadership team. Virginia’s central IT
organization, for example, includes a “Chief Customer Experience Officer” to manage to positive
user experience targets. Texas uses a dotted and solid line reporting structure for select IT roles,
including a dotted line reporting between the Executive Director and CIO and procurement teams.
California’s IT organization includes both an “Office of Statewide Project Delivery” and a
“Strategic Initiatives” team, each reporting to the Deputy State Chief Information Officer to
coordinate resources across the state’s project portfolio and advance organization-specific
strategic priorities. See Appendix 5G for details on state IT organizations.
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ARKANSAS FORWARD: STRATEGIC PROCUREMENT PLAN
THE ARKANSAS FORWARD IMPERATIVE
Governor Sanders launched Arkansas Forward with the aspiration for the State of Arkansas to set the
standard for government efficiency and effectiveness through enterprise-wide operational change.
Achieving such an aspiration will include delivery of better state government services, at less cost, for all
Arkansans. To do so, state employees, teams, and departments will need to work together in new ways
and with new skills. Delivering Arkansas Forward’s potential, therefore, will require improving the state
government’s purchasing power through improved procurement capabilities fulfilling departmental needs
quickly and efficiently.
For these reasons, Governor Sanders has called for a redesign of Arkansas state government’s approach to
procurement focused on efficiency and speed, user experience, collaboration, analytics, and value. A new
approach centered upon partnership with department leaders to identify and fulfill procurement needs can
foster an efficient, effective procurement strategy for the state of Arkansas.
This paper:
● Summarizes challenges with the state’s current approach to procurement and the imperative for
systematic change to deliver Arkansas Forward’s potential
● Introduces the main elements of a new system for public sector procurement that prioritizes
partnership with departmental leaders and use of analytics to understand and deliver state needs
● Emphasizes the importance of internal capability building and ongoing change management practices
to engage the statewide procurement workforce
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Arkansas executive departments have ~$1.7B of PO and P-card spend across a broad set of commodities
and services. Today, Arkansas does not capture the potential benefit of scale the spend base offers.
Procurement leaders across departments cite challenges, including low percentages of in-focus spend
flowing through statewide contracts, limited capacity for strategic category management, manual
solicitations processes, and inefficient division of resources between oversight and strategic tasks.
Based on a review of Arkansas’ existing contracts and an assessment against peer state and private sector
procurement practices, Arkansas may realize a ~$140-230M savings opportunity by making a series of
changes to its procurement practices, centered on three priorities — getting the “right stuff”, at the “right
(total) price”, through the “right processes”. Getting the “right stuff” includes making product categories
consistent across departments, aligning product specifications, and proactively managing demand to right-
size purchasing. Procuring at the “right (total) price” includes consolidating contracts for commodities
and services and enhancing rigor of the RFP negotiation process for major solicitations to achieve better
rates and terms. Implementing the “right processes” includes optimizing procurement processes for speed
and value by deploying a user- and supplier-friendly end-to-end e-procurement system and enhancing
capabilities of our procurement staff, e.g., through expanded professional development programs,
trainings, modified governance processes, and enhanced procurement solutions.
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Pursuing potential efficiency and effectiveness opportunities across the procurement system will require a
shift in the current operating model and a statewide commitment to a standardized, consistent, data-
driven, and cooperative procurement processes across departments. In order to facilitate this shift, 40
initiatives have been prioritized and aligned to each of the three procurement priorities: managing demand
for vendors and support (“right stuff”), refining pricing through analytical category management (“right
price”), and optimizing processes for speed and value (“right processes”).
Preliminary initiatives the Arkansas Forward team prioritized include, for example, developing and
executing a standard negotiation process for upcoming large contracts; consolidating select services
contracts across the state; awarding state contracts for commonly purchased commodities; designing a
user- and supplier-friendly e-procurement system; and launching a robust certification for procurement
personnel across departments, roles, and tenures. A list of initiatives with initial prioritization and
sequencing as well as a supporting change management and implementation plan are presented in the
final section of this document.
SUMMARY OF CURRENT STATE PROCUREMENT ACTIVITY, OPERATIONS, AND PERFORMANCE
A. Current procurement spend activity
In 2023, Arkansas’ Annual Comprehensive Financial Report revealed the state handled ~$22.3B in total
expenses. Of the roughly $22.3B in expenses, Arkansas’ executive department PO and P-card spend
accounted for ~7%, or $1.7B, of spend across a wide array of commodities and services, including IT
commodities, rentals and leases, administrative services, professional services, and facilities management.
Small percentage point reductions to the $1.7B in executive department spend have the potential to
translate into millions of dollars of efficiency improvements for Arkansans. As such, PO and P-card spend
is the focus for the Arkansas Forward procurement spend efficiency and effectiveness effort.
Exhibit 1
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B. Spend benchmarking
Analyzing Arkansas’ spend relative to peers on the largest services and commodity spend categories
reveals several potential savings opportunities. High-level category analysis on Arkansas’ in-focus spend
revealed clear groupings of similar products/services, including professional services, IT services, facility
management, IT commodities, rental / leases, as well as medical, education, equipment, insurance,
building and construction, accommodations and hospitality, administration and staffing, food and edibles,
and other commodities and services. Together, these spend categories account for roughly $1.7B in
procurement spend. Analysis within each spend category identified opportunity to optimize pricing and
the quantity and grade of commodities purchased.
Benchmarking analysis of the spend categories revealed ~$140-230M in savings potential across three
opportunity categories: (1) managing demand for vendors and support, (2) refining pricing through
analytical category management, and (3) optimizing procurement processes. See Exhibit 2 for a
breakdown of estimated value opportunity per spend category, and reference Appendix 1 (pg. 5) for
example products and services within each spend category. Appendix 1 (pg. 4-9) also contains more detail
on category opportunities by spend type.
1. Getting the “right stuff” (Managing demand for vendors and support):
A review of product-focused spend categories revealed opportunities to capture value through economies
of scale (i.e., leveraging the state’s large purchase volumes to negotiate better rates) and sourcing the
correct quantity and grade of materials. These spend categories were grouped into one larger opportunity
lever— “managing demand for vendors and support”—for opportunity analysis. As seen in the exhibit
below, estimated improvement ranges, which are based on best-in-class procurement transformations,
were applied to each product-focused category’s 2023 spend total to estimate the potential improvement
range. The lower end of the improvement range represents the conservative full potential of improvement,
whereas the top end of the improvement range represents the maximum improvement range, assuming no
resource constraints. Arkansas should aim to capture at least the median value of the improvement range.
As such, pursuing efficiency and effectiveness improvements through the management of demand has the
potential to produce ~$54-85M in savings opportunity.
2. At the “right (total) price (Refining pricing through analytical category management):
Service-focused spend categories, including professional services, IT services, and facility management
services, revealed opportunity to capture value through price renegotiations and the review of contract
terms. These categories were therefore grouped into one larger opportunity bucket— “refining pricing
through analytical category management”—for opportunity analysis.
Using the same estimation method discussed above, estimated improvement ranges, which are based on
best-in-class procurement transformations, were applied to each service-focused category’s 2023 spend
total to estimate the potential improvement range. As seen in Exhibit 2, refining pricing through analytical
category management represents a potential savings opportunity of ~$88-143M. The lower end of the
improvement range represents the conservative full potential of improvement, and the top end of the
improvement range represents the maximum improvement range, assuming no resource constraints.
3. Through the "right processes”(Optimizing procurement processes for speed and value):
Further analysis of Arkansas’ procurement processes revealed additional efficiency and effectiveness
opportunities exist through adopting an end-to-end e-procurement system and enhancing professional
development programs. These opportunities, and other enablement activities like renewed governance and
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data management, were aggregated under the “optimizing procurement processes for speed and value”
opportunity lever. While enablement solutions like these do not have direct ties to monetary savings, they
do facilitate speed and efficiency improvements and are critical to empowering Arkansas procurement
teams to realize the potential of Arkansas Forward.
Exhibit 2
C. Diagnostic of spend opportunities
Working sessions with department leaders and benchmarking analyses surfaced significant opportunities
for additional procurement value capture. Less than 10% of the $1.7B targeted spending is currently
conducted through statewide contracts, limiting potential to leverage scale as a procurement advantage.
Furthermore, only two OSP managers oversee all statewide contracts, limiting the organization’s capacity
for strategic category management. Only 1 out of 15 executive departments utilizes a fully electronic
solicitation process, which would offer both efficiency and effectiveness advantages if deployed
statewide. Across procurement functions, most time and resources are devoted to compliance with
procurement laws and review processes, with limited capacity for broader strategic initiatives focused on
unlocking value, understanding the state’s procurement needs, and facilitating an effective, efficient
process to fulfill those needs.
Similarly, a Global Procurement Excellence 360 survey assessed Arkansas’ procurement performance
relative to best practices and revealed strengths and weaknesses in the state’s procurement strategy. The
assessment, as outlined in Exhibit 3, evaluated Arkansas’ current procurement maturity across 13
elements of a next generation procurement operating model and ranked its performance relative to peer
and all industries averages. Relative to peer benchmarks, the Arkansas procurement organization has
several advantages:
● Arkansas’ procurement organization exhibits some level of centralization through statewide
procurement and some procurement activities taking place at the department level.
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● The state’s current procurement policies and process standardization lay the groundwork for
operational effectiveness between departments.
● Source-to-contract and procure-to-pay processes have a clear separation of roles.
The assessment also revealed several gaps in the state’s procurement maturity:
● Arkansas scored slightly below the public sector average in overall procurement assessment and
lagged top-performing peers across several categories.
● The lack of overall procurement strategy creates suboptimal sourcing, limiting value capture.
● Categories, performance metrics, and KPIs could be further defined and tracked to boost procurement
performance.
● Supplier development and management functions could be strengthened and formalized.
● Adoption of digital capabilities could be increased to standardize and monitor spend, and talent
development mechanisms could be improved to boost internal knowledge and capabilities.
Exhibit 3
Overall, Arkansas’ current procurement organization reflects a decentralized structure and compliance-
oriented culture, with fragmented approaches to category and contract management, governance, and
internal capability building. Arkansas Forward represents an opportunity for the current procurement
system to 1) better manage demand for vendors and support, 2) refine pricing through analytical category
management, and 3) optimize procurement processes for speed and value. See Appendix 1 (pg. 3) for the
methodology used to assess procurement opportunity.
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● Managing demand for vendors and support: Arkansas experiences inconsistent product categories
and specifications across departments leading to difficulties tracking spend, demand, and vendor
utilization.
● Refining pricing through analytical category management: Arkansas exhibits inefficient vendor
identification and contracting processes, and the lack of analytical capabilities hinders its ability to
achieve better rates. To realize better terms with vendors and improve spend performance, the
procurement organization will need to bolster procurement-related knowledge and skills (e.g.,
negotiation, vendor management, category management, analytics, etc.). Additional information about
capabilities of focus can be found in the next section.
● Optimizing procurement processes for speed and value: Currently, no standard spend data
categorization hierarchy is used, and departments rely on antiquated infrastructure to track
procurement performance and demand over time. Procurement processes are managed manually and
across multiple systems with little data to inform preemptive negotiation due diligence. Additionally,
there are unclear divisions of procurement responsibilities across operating activities and capability
building mechanisms (e.g., negotiation), limiting Arkansas’ ability to capture value.
VISION FOR FUTURE STATE
A. Guiding design principles for defining the future state
The target “future state” for state procurement capabilities is centered on five fundamental design
principles, which represent the strategic priorities of the organization. Each procurement initiative will
improve Arkansas’ procurement function with respect to one or more of these design principles:
efficiency and speed, user experience, collaboration, analytical foundation, and value.
Exhibit 4
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Efficiency and Speed
An upgraded e-procurement system, clearly defined roles and responsibilities, and analytical procurement
tools will enable timely solicitation processes and contract reviews and will help the procurement
organization become more efficient and streamlined.
User Experience
The procurement workforce will benefit from clearly defined roles, responsibilities, and procurement
governance processes (e.g., data categorization hierarchy, mandatory contract guidelines, shared services
model) to reduce confusion and rework. Procurement training and professional development programs
will be widely used to boost internal capabilities and encourage talent motivation and retention.
Collaboration
Departments will partner with the Office of State Procurement throughout the procurement process and
elicit support and insight from DFA and other supporting organizations, where needed. Collaboration of
procurement professionals and supporting organizations will be fostered through regular cross-functional
meetings and communications.
Analytical Foundation
Arkansas will build an analytical foundation featuring clearly defined data categorization hierarchies and
data governance practices. The organization will use a strong foundation of KPIs and SLAs (e.g., year on
year savings, percent compliance with specs, on time delivery, etc.) to track internal and external
performance and support insights-driven decision making. Data will be easily digestible and understood
across the procurement organization and exist within a single platform or dashboard.
Value
Arkansas will focus on driving value across the procurement organization using economies of scale.
Contracts will be frequently renegotiated and exited as needed to capture more value per dollar of spend,
and mandatory contracts will be used to regulate spend and the quality of procured goods and services.
In pursuit of these five tenets, Arkansas’ future procurement organization will feature streamlined
processes to enable departmental efforts; simplified procurement processes that are easy to understand
and manage; collaborations with department leaders and procurement professionals to identify and fulfill
needs; decisions supported by data-driven insights; and utilization of economies of scale to maximize
value.
B. Considerations for transforming Arkansas Procurement
To guide its future state vision for the procurement organization, Arkansas will implement a step-by-step
approach to transformation based on best practices from other states. States with exemplary procurement
organizations take a strategic approach to customer (i.e., department) segmentation, category grouping,
spend transparency, structure, people, processes, and technology. More details on initiatives and
implementation steps to activate these best practices are outlined in Sections 3 and 4.
Managing demand for vendors and support
Customer segmentation and category grouping will help Arkansas manage demand for vendors and
support by optimizing service levels and focusing support.
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By implementing customer (i.e., department) segmentation best practices, Arkansas will balance trade-
offs between speed, cost, and quality to accommodate individual departments, each of which may have
different priorities, while maintaining compliance. Understanding the inherent procurement capabilities
within each department will dictate the level and type of support needed from Arkansas’ central
procurement function.
Beyond understanding its departments, Arkansas will build procurement processes and vary the level of
centralized support based on the risk, cost, commonality, and level of innovation needed for each type of
good or service. For example, the compliance requirements and level of detailed technical knowledge
needed to procure IT service providers handling sensitive state data is very different from the purchase of
commodity goods from well-established vendors.
Additionally, grouping similar goods and services into clearly defined categories based on risk, cost,
commonality, and level of innovation will aid Arkansas in procurement analysis, sourcing strategy, and
governance. Illustrative examples of category groupings include office supplies, facilities maintenance,
and IT equipment. The category approach will allow Arkansas to view its entire spend in a common
language across departments and target effort where it is most needed to achieve the desired procurement
posture.
Refining pricing through analytical category management
Spend transparency will help Arkansas refine pricing through analytical category management. Arkansas’
central procurement function will establish a full, enterprise-wide view of spend broken down by
department, suppliers, and category, which will provide a fact-base for resourcing decisions by the central
procurement function or by individual departments and will provide the data needed to drive
improvements across each dimension of its balanced procurement posture.
Maintaining a centralized view of who is purchasing what across departments will enable the centralized
procurement function to implement core procurement processes tailored by department, the procured
item’s complexity, and potential value to be gained by pooling demand and combining bids for similar
procurements across the state. In practice, this customization is typically reflected in variable decision
rights between the requirements owner and the central procurement function for requirements definition,
category-strategy creation and enforcement, negotiation and procurement approval, and ongoing supplier
management.
Optimizing procurement processes for speed and value
Implementing a series of organization and governance structural elements, processes, people-focused
programs, and technology systems will help Arkansas optimize procurement processes for speed and
value.
Within organization and governance, improved category strategies and clear ownership will promote
agility and a strong foundation for transparency and value capture across Arkansas’ procurement
organization.
Arkansas will develop thoughtful and dynamic category strategies, refreshed at regular intervals.
Category strategies, resulting from rigorous analysis of requirements, spend, and suppliers, outline the
ideal acquisition approach and provide guidance to requirements owners and contracting officers in all
components. They include detailed guidance on supplier strategies, risk management, approaches for
maximum value capture, performance management, and contracting vehicles. The strategies are typically
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October 9, 2024
developed by a cross functional team led by the category “owner” and are refreshed on an annual or
semiannual basis. See Appendix 3B (pg. 36-44) for more information on category strategies.
The state will also assign clear ownership and accountability for each category. Categories are managed
by an accountable individual or team and are aligned to the department that is the natural owner. Category
owners develop category strategies, provide guidance, and help ensure the department adheres to the
guidance.
Arkansas will also ensure processes are streamlined and standardized enterprise-wide by implementing
the following features:
● Streamline end-to-end processes from requirements definition through to contract close. Arkansas
will deploy a full set of levers to make core procurement and acquisition processes user-friendly, fast,
and compliant. End-to-end processes will be designed through value-stream mapping and optimized
to improve end-user experience. Arkansas may consider implementing customized or tiered processes
based on the procurement size, risk, and procuring entity. For example, Georgia’s central procurement
function utilizes a tier-based procurement system to help its departments determine what type of
contract to use. See Appendix 3B (pg. 45) for more information.
● Develop rigorous contractor-performance management processes. To enable high-performance in its
procurement organization, Arkansas will integrate contractor performance management in its
processes, have clear performance-management processes, and provide appropriate training.
● Implement efficient and effective internal acquisition review processes that help ensure acquisitions
align with category strategies and meet organizational objectives. Arkansas will adopt one quick
review process at the department level (with lower thresholds) and one at the enterprise level,
providing clear guidance as to what’s required and time to allow appropriate change of course.
● Develop a regular process to assess the value and performance of major contracts to ensure they are
optimized for speed, cost, quality, and compliance. Arkansas will conduct cleansheet analyses based
on real performance data and best practices ahead of new acquisitions, when contracts come up for
renewal, and periodically throughout the life of long-duration contracts. Cleansheet analyses are a
strategic procurement tool used to gain a detailed understanding of the cost structure of a product or
service. Specifically, OSP will calculate the lowest feasible price of a product or service by evaluating
all cost components involved in its production and delivery. See Appendix 3B (pg. 61-63) for more
information.
Arkansas will build a talented and motivated workforce by prioritizing continuous skill building and a
culture that prioritizes citizen and government outcomes. Key elements include the following:
● Establish training and capability building for the core procurement workforce across all elements of
the procurement value chain. Arkansas will invest in training and development opportunities for its
procurement workforce to help with overall performance and employee retention and motivation.
Investments in training may include hiring external vendor support, hiring new talent, or developing
new tools internally.
● Provide accessible, timely training and support for those who work with the procurement workforce.
Much of the end-to-end procurement process happens outside of the official procurement office. As
such, Arkansas’ central procurement function will act as an advisor to requirements owners, offering
easy-to-access support.
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October 9, 2024
● Build a culture of collaboration. Arkansas will view procurement professionals as critical to every
element of the organization’s performance, treat them as important collaborators, and allow the
procurement workforce opportunities to embed with non-procurement offices. Arkansas will build an
appropriately risk acceptant workforce that balances cost, speed, and quality with compliance.
Most importantly, within technology, Arkansas’ procurement organization will rely on supporting IT
systems to implement a best-in-class procurement model. Arkansas’ procurement IT system will include
the following features:
● Maintain a single procurement data source. Arkansas will maintain a single source of procurement
data, either through a single enterprise contract-management system (ideally) or a reporting process
that feeds data from disparate systems into a central, frequently updated hub.
● Clarify data standards for procurement data. Arkansas’ procurement information will be supported by
an infrastructure of common data and reporting standards—for example, material codes—that make it
easy to match contracts to categories and perform comparative analyses.
C. Defining the future state
The vision for Arkansas’ future state procurement organization is based on interviews with procurement
leaders, diagnostic benchmarking analyses, a review of procurement best practices, and the cornerstone
design principles above. Overall, Arkansas Forward represents an opportunity to evolve procurement
from a decentralized, compliance-oriented organization with various approaches to category and contract
management, governance, and internal capability building to a shared-services and analytics-led
organization centered around collaboration, with standardized approaches to category management and
centralized governance and robust internal capability building mechanisms.
The transition goals are organized across three dimensions:
Managing demand for vendors and support: In its future state, Arkansas’ procurement organization
will use consistent product categories, specifications, and taxonomies across departments and will
proactively manage demand to right-size purchasing.
Refining pricing through analytical category management: Arkansas will efficiently identify
opportunities for value capture in the procurement process and leverage its improved capabilities to
enhance the rigor of its RFP negotiation process for major solicitations and achieve better rates and terms.
Optimizing procurement processes for speed and value: Arkansas will deploy user- and supplier-
friendly end-to-end e-procurement systems and capabilities and use refined process and data governance
measures to drive data-backed and timely solicitation processes.
The table below depicts the granular capability changes that will take place in Arkansas’ procurement
organization across the three dimensions.
Summary
Capability From … To …
Operating model Decentralized, compliance-oriented A shared services and analytics-led
procurement organization with various organization centered around collaboration,
approaches to category and contract with standardized approaches to category
management, governance, and internal management and centralized governance and
capability building robust internal capability building
mechanisms
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Managing demand for vendors and support
Capability From … To …
Product Inconsistent product categories and All executive departments are aligned to a
categorization specifications across department (e.g., IT standard category taxonomy that features
commodities) visibility into commodities & services needed
and purchased, and how vendors are being
utilized
Refining pricing through analytical category management
Capability From … To …
Opportunity Inefficient vendor identification Early, more efficient, and analytics-driven
identification contracting processes, unitization and identification of opportunities for vendor
competitive intelligence hinder ability to consolidation, statewide contracting
achieve better rates opportunities, price harmonization, and other
cost-savings actions
Professional Opportunity to grow knowledge and skills Procurement employees, department leads,
development needed to optimize spend performance; and related positions have the skills and
difficulty engaging with procurement knowledge needed to successfully execute
partners across contract categories (e.g., RFB) and
competently engage with procurement
partners
Optimizing procurement processes for speed and value
Capability From … To …
Data governance No standard spend data categorization Outline agreements, purchase requisitions, and
hierarchy is in place; departments rely on purchase orders all utilize the same, standard
a customized material group codes data categorization hierarchy derived from
analytical reviews of purchasing data
Supplier and bid Bid and contract specifications are Bids are managed in a consolidated e-
management manually updated across multiple systems procurement system and are automatically
converted into systematized contract entries
upon award
Accountability Insufficient infrastructure to track Strong foundation of actionable KPIs evaluate
mechanisms Procurement performance and demand State procurement performance improvement
over time over time; performance data is analyzed to
identify key focus areas
Active contract Contract terms are managed offline by Contracts are routinely monitored and are
management each department’s procurement team, and automatically flagged by the e-procurement
contract expiry is checked manually. See system when set to expire; procurement team
Appendix 1 (pg. 13). uses data to make decision about renewal or
re-bid
Proactive contract Little preemptive contract management Individual contracts include actionable, data-
management with vendors; individual contracts lack driven SLAs and KPIs to enable effective
SLAs and KPIs needed to monitor contract management and performance
performance dialogues with vendors
Process Unclear delineation of Procurement Clear delineation of Procurement
governance responsibilities and degree of responsibilities and shared services across
centralization (e.g., shared services) executive departments (i.e., which
across operating activities departments provide final contract review,
technical insights, and negotiation support)
Mandatory Mandatory contracts are seldom used Established guidelines for which commodities
contracts across the Procurement organization; little should be managed under mandatory
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precedent exists for review and contracts; proven process for legislative
syndication process review and syndication
Negotiation Limited negotiation capabilities (e.g.,Robust negotiation capabilities resulting from
knowledge, tools, and processes) training sessions, external vendor support,
hiring, or tools
Change management
Capability From … To …
Vision Stakeholders do not know about or Stakeholders understand the potential impact
understand Arkansas Forward and are excited for the future
Collaboration Procurement teams work predominantly Procurement regularly works with others on
within departments cross-departmental working teams
Strategic action Procurement teams spend time ensuring Procurement proactively identifies
adherence to policy, not necessarily opportunities, and once aligned, ensures the
thinking strategically right steps are taken to pursue value
Adaptability Teams are comfortable with legacy ways Procurement is excited about new approaches
of working and aren’t motived to change and methods and regularly communicates
about what does and does not work
Operationally, Arkansas’ future state procurement organization will be centrally managed with
department-led execution and input. The Office of State Procurement will provide overall direction and
support throughout the procurement process, but activities will be executed at the department level. OSP
will maintain training and standards for the procurement function and manage cross-functional
interactions with support functions.
Exhibit 5
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Under the future state operating model, key procurement sub-functions will move from being primarily
governed and administered by departments to being centrally governed and administered by OSP.
As seen in Exhibit 6 below, procurement sub-functions can be assessed across a scale of centralization:
Distributed governance and administration functions are managed and administered by departments,
with little guidance from OSP. In the future state, procurement ordering processes (e.g., administrative
contracting processes like handling vendor payments, facilitating communications with suppliers,
updating records, and administering contracts) will be managed and executed by departments.
Centrally supported, distributed administration functions are managed and administered by
departments with frequent support provided by OSP. In the future state, need analysis will be primarily
owned by departments with guidance provided by OSP. However, for prioritized categories, based on
criticality, scale or other identified value opportunities, OSP will provide greater governance and support.
In most instances, departments will be responsible for tracking demand for department-specific items;
whereas OSP will track demand for state-wide commodities and services. OSP will advise departments on
demand forecasting strategies and will support the departments in their need analysis by managing the
collection and distribution of procurement data in a shared, analytical format.
Centrally governed, distributed administration functions are managed by OSP, but day-to-day
activities are executed by departments. Key sub-functions operating under this model in the future state
include category management, negotiation, vendor management, P-card spend, department solicitations
drafting1, and spend analytics. Policies, infrastructure, training, and guidelines for these functions will be
managed by OSP, but the departments will be responsible for carrying out these activities. For example,
as demonstrated in Exhibit 5 above, OSP will launch negotiation training programs and oversee
negotiation finalization during the contract evaluation process, but departments will be responsible for
driving the negotiations with suppliers and conducting supplier evaluations.
Category management is a particular capability of focus since little category management maturity exists
in the current state. OSP will further develop its category management capabilities in the future state and
will create category strategies for key products and service. See Appendix 3A (pg. 29, 33) and 3B (pg. 36-
44) for more detail.
Centrally governed and administered functions are managed by OSP, and day-to-day activities are
executed by OSP. In the future state, key sub-functions that will be managed and executed by OSP include
governance related functions like drafting OSP contracts1, mandatory contracts, process regulatory
standardization and documentation, policy making and compliance (including reporting), capability
building and training, and performance management. Supplier market analysis, a solicitation-focused sub-
function, will also be governed and administered by the central procurement function for at scale
contracts.
In addition, OSP will be responsible for the central management and execution of Arkansas’ analytics
capabilities, owning the database management and data governance sub-functions. As mentioned
previously, OSP is responsible for establishing a holistic, state-wide view of spend broken down by
department, suppliers, and spend category.
1
OSP will determine procurements for central management on a spend-threshold basis, beginning with select large
procurements and gradually expanding to lower-spend procurements as the central team build capacity and
capabilities for multiple solicitations.
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October 9, 2024
The data governance and database management functions are crucial to setting the strategic direction of
OSP’s analytical focus, launching comprehensive procurement analytics tools, and standardizing data
rules across departments to allow for a holistic view of procurement spend and performance. OSP will be
responsible for setting the standards on what procurement-related data fields should be collected at the
department and state levels, aggregating these KPIs and SLAs into an easily digestible format (e.g.,
dashboard), enforcing the use of analytics in procurement processes and decision making, and
maintaining analytical standards across the procurement organization. For example, OSP will set
standards on vendor performance and work with departments to collect data on how vendors are tracking
relative to agreed upon SLAs. The departments will then leverage this data, which is easily accessible
through an analytical platform, to track vendor performance and intercede with suppliers as needed to
ensure contracted terms and service levels are being met. See Appendix 3B (pg. 57-60) for more guidance
on performance management best practices.
Exhibit 6
EVALUATION OF FEASIBILITY AND IMPACT OF POTENTIAL INITIATIVES
A. Summary of interventions
To realize its future state vision, Arkansas has identified a set of 40 near-term and long-term initiatives to
be implemented over the next 30+ months. See Exhibit 7 for the comprehensive list of initiatives. By
implementing these initiatives and key enabling activities, Arkansas plans to realize up to $155M in
estimated annual recurring savings. The 40 initiatives address key opportunities for additional value
capture, including developing a standardized data taxonomy, setting a category management strategy,
upskilling the procurement workforce, and engaging central procurement authority earlier in the P2P
process. See Appendix 2 (pg. 18) for more details on the estimated annual opportunity per initiative
category.
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October 9, 2024
B. Prioritized initiatives
The 40 initiatives identified during Wave 1 have been prioritized according to expected annual impact,
feasibility to execute, and timeline to implementation and are grouped into categories by opportunity type.
Initiatives that are easy to execute, or “familiar”, to the procurement organization, are considered quick
wins and have been mapped to a near-term implementation horizon. Similarly, initiatives that require
additional support or more time to execute have been mapped to medium-term or long-term horizons,
depending on their level of complexity and pathway to execution. Appendix 2 (pg. 19) contains more
information on how the initiatives were prioritized and mapped across horizons.
Exhibit 7 outlines the list of 40 procurement initiatives that were identified during Wave 1 of Arkansas
Forward. The list contains the initiative name and tracking number, and the initiatives have been grouped
by opportunity category. The initiatives, which link to the master initiative file and TSG initiative
charters, are mapped to owners across TSS, DFA, and Human Services Departments and are managed
under the Arkansas Forward project management organization’s regular weekly and monthly meetings.
The following pages outline the pathway to implementation for these initiatives and the potential change
management and enablement activities that may be actioned to capture value across the procurement
organization. See Appendix 2 (pg. 16-17, 21-25), and the Master Initiative List for more detail.
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Exhibit 7
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October 9, 2024
C. Additional opportunities to capture value
New innovations in Generative AI (GenAI) represent further opportunities to capture value in Arkansas’
procurement processes. Common GenAI use cases that are increasingly being employed across public and
private sector institutions to increase the speed, efficiency, and ease of procurement processes include
category management co-pilot, RFP management system, negotiation coach and trainer, contract
evaluation tool, contract drafting tool, supplier intelligence and management platform, proactive
procurement risk management system, and P2P process automation. See Appendix 1 (pg. 14) for more
information on next horizons GenAI-enabled procurement efficiencies.
High-impact solutions for Arkansas include a GenAI-powered contract optimization tool that can analyze
large volumes of procurement contracts, compare contract terms to defined benchmarks, and generate
recommendations for renegotiations to reduce contract value leakage, and an automated contract drafting
system that creates RFPs with recommended terms and conditions. Similarly, a GenAI-powered price
benchmarking tool can provide a comprehensive repository of real-time market, category intelligence, and
price benchmarking data to inform the negotiation process. These types of solutions can help Arkansas
boost its capabilities across the contract management lifecycle, embed data into its decision-making, and
streamline procurement processes to optimize value.
The prioritized set of initiatives contains two notable initiatives that leverage GenAI solutions to enhance
the procurement organization. Initiative FUNC-17 aims to deploy a contract assessment system that
leverages GenAI to monitor contract terms and make recommendations for optimization. Initiative
FUNC-28 seeks to establish a structured contract terms database by using GenAI to move contract
language from unstructured files to consolidated database.
IMPLEMENTATION AND CHANGE MANAGEMENT PLAN
A. Pathways to future state
Three transformation “horizons” provide guideposts to track and manage progress towards the target
procurement future state. Exhibit 8 summarizes initiatives by opportunity type and horizon, including:
Launch: The “Launch” phase reflects the first 12 months of implementation and focuses on building
momentum, establishing core enablement procurement processes and governance structures, piloting
changes in select product categories, and rationalizing high priority spend categories.
Scale: The “Scale” phase reflects the next 18 months of implementation and focuses on scaling piloted
improvements to more product categories, refining core enablement processes and governance structures,
and bolstering internal capabilities through statewide use of best practices.
Continuously improve: The “Continuously improve” phase reflects implementation 30+ months into the
future and focuses on continuous improvement, deployment of enablement tools, and coordination of
procurement strategies across related departments.
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October 9, 2024
Exhibit 8
B. Sequencing over horizons and rollout plan
To realize future state outcomes, Arkansas can organize its 40 initiatives and supporting implementation
activities into a comprehensive phasing plan. The plan, outlined in Exhibit 9, organizes initiative-based
activities across three interim phases, spanning over the next 30+ months. The sequenced view of
opportunity levers can help Arkansas assess performance relative to future state goals, anticipate
roadblocks, proactively schedule meetings for key decision points, and identify opportunities for
additional opportunity-enhancing projects.
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October 9, 2024
Exhibit 9
To achieve the future state vision, Arkansas will standardize product categorization and taxonomies across
departments and create category strategies2; identify which commodities should be sourced via statewide
contracts; implement mandatory contracts for commodity spend categories; renegotiate current contracts
as they expire and optimize future contracts; establish a statewide e-procurement system to bolster
analytical capabilities; establish trainings and professional development pathways; implement new
governance policies, capacity shifts, and organizational designs; and establish change management
activities to drive buy-in boosting behavior and mindset changes. See Appendix 3A (pg. 28-32) for
detailed information about the key activities and strategies needed to realize future state outcomes.
Several key activities are considered critical to the transformation of Arkansas’ procurement organization.
Most notably, in the first 6 months, Arkansas will need to:
• Begin building category strategies
• Identify the commodities eligible for mandatory contracts
• Establish negotiation best practices
• Adopt a Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) approach
• Define e-procurement system requirements
• Define KPIs and SLAs to track procurement performance
Successfully executing the 6-month critical activities will provide the procurement organization with a
strong implementation foundation. Reference Appendix 3A (pg. 33-34) for more information on the 6-
month critical activities and Appendix 3B (pg. 36-60) for best practice materials related to the critical
activities.
2
OSP will align product and service categories to UNSPSC codes by the end of FY 2025.
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C. Change management and enablement activities
Realizing and sustaining the opportunity from Arkansas Forward activities requires a broader,
complimentary, change management and communications effort to promote adoption of new initiatives
and buy-in into the new procurement operating model. In accordance with the guiding principles, the
future state procurement organization will aspire to foster speed and efficiency, a seamless user
experience, cross-functional collaboration, analytics-driven decision making, and maximized value
through economies of scale. To achieve these qualities, Arkansas will adopt a collection of change
management activities inspired by the guiding principles and best practice approaches to procurement
change management.
Successful change programs utilize four key pillars to motivate mindset and behavior changes, including
role modeling, understanding and conviction, confidence and skill building, and reinforcement with
formal mechanisms.
Exhibit 10
Arkansas will adopt change management practices across all four influence quadrants to boost
implementation success.
● Department leaders will employ a series of communication mechanisms for the Arkansas Forward
imperative and keep the procurement workforce informed on key policy and process changes. For
example, OSP leaders can demonstrate the benefits of the analytical approach to procurement through
showcasing projected savings from new statewide contracts.
● Procurement leaders will also implement formal mechanisms to track implementation progress and
reinforce behavior, mindset, and process shifts. For example, OSP can establish mandatory strategic
procurement meetings to reinforce partnerships between OSP and departments, and it can organize
OSP and department procurement teams around category-specific goals and spend targets.
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● Procurement leaders will inspire confidence and competency in the procurement organization’s core
toolkit through robust training and coaching. Examples of confidence boosting change management
activities include training the procurement organization on the new operating model and delineation
of duties outlined by OSP and launching recurring training workshops for department procurement
officers on solicitation best practices (e.g., negotiation, vendor management, need analysis, etc.).
● Department leaders will also implement a series of role modeling activities to demonstrate leadership
buy-in, encourage procurement workforce buy-in, and ultimately drive cultural change. For example,
OSP and department leaders can hold regular status updates with teams to understand implementation
progress and challenges, and identify areas for improvement.
Additional examples of change management activities that relate to the five future state guiding principles
can be found in Appendix 3C (pg. 65-66). Appendix 3C also sequences the detailed change management
activities across the “Launch”, “Scale”, and “Continuously improve” horizons.
D. Implications for procurement-related processes
While implementing its key activity phasing plan, Arkansas will need to monitor interdependencies
between the procurement organization, other domains within the Transformation and Shared Services
department (e.g., DFA, DIS, Fleet, Real Estate, etc.), and other State of Arkansas departments and
proactively mitigate disruptions. Anticipated interdependencies include:
● Managing cross-functional initiatives: Several procurement initiatives are owned by departments
other than TSS (e.g., DFA, Human Services) and will require cross-departmental and cross-functional
collaboration. For example, initiatives FUNC-5, FUNC-7, and FUNC-20 pertain to standardizing
fleet specifications and optimizing fleet contracts and will require close coordination with the fleet
team.
● Allocating state and federal funding to new procurement costs: Several Arkansas Forward activities
(i.e., establishing a statewide e-procurement system and instituting robust capability building and
training programs) will require OSP to work with DFA to secure funding.
● Collaborating with Arkansas Legislative Council: Creating new procurement processes and
governance policies will require OSP to work closely with the ALC as it navigates legislative reviews
and deadlines. OSP will use data-driven procurement performance reports to inform the ALC on
ongoing needs and performance of the procurement organization.
● Shifting operating model and capacity needs: [Pending benchmarking analysis to estimate
implications of shared services model on procurement teams (e.g., range of FTE needs)]
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ARKANSAS FORWARD: VEHICLE FLEET MANAGEMENT PLAN
THE ARKANSAS FORWARD IMPERATIVE
Governor Sanders launched Arkansas Forward with the aspiration for the State of Arkansas to set the
standard for government efficiency and effectiveness through enterprise-wide operational change.
Achieving such an aspiration will include delivery of better state government services, at less cost, for all
Arkansans. To do so, state employees, teams, and departments will need to work together in new ways
and with new skills. Delivering Arkansas Forward’s potential, therefore, will require optimizing the
state’s vehicle fleet, fulfilling organizational needs effectively and efficiently.
For these reasons, Governor Sanders has called for a redesign of Arkansas state government’s approach to
fleet management focused on utilization, user experience, coordination, and value. A new approach
centered on partnership with agency leaders to identify and fulfill transportation needs can foster an
efficient, effective fleet management strategy for Arkansas.
This paper:
● Summarizes challenges with the state’s current approach and the imperative for systematic change to
deliver Arkansas Forward’s potential
● Introduces the main elements of a new system for fleet management
● Highlights the central importance of internal capability building and robust change management
practices to sustain change
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Arkansas’ cabinet departments operate a fleet of 3,980 passenger vehicles costing ~$21M annually. This
fleet is managed in DFA by one full-time fleet manager, one part-time administrator, and one part-time
assistant administrator.
Department fleet leaders have flagged multiple fleet pain points including:
● Limited volume of vehicles available on statewide contract, which can take up to 9 months to be
delivered
● 600+ vehicles logged less than 100 miles in 2023, and vehicle funding mechanisms limit inter-
department vehicle pooling
● Maintenance and refueling is sought out as-needed, often without comparing costs
● The fleet data ecosystem is fractured; four key data sources have been combined for the first time
during this effort
In total, analysis shows an estimated annual efficiency opportunity of $3M-5M, one-time revenue
opportunity of $1M-1.5M, a reduction in fleet size of at least 860 vehicles, and an opportunity to lower
the average vehicle age from 9 to 4 years (which will decrease operating costs and increase trade-in
value). This impact can be achieved through the following:
1. Buy lowest priced comparable vehicle within each vehicle class
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October 9, 2024
2. Optimize vehicle holding period to minimize the total cost of ownership
3. Create inter-department vehicle pools and establish usage policies
4. Realign trips to the most cost-effective mode of transportation
5. Negotiate a statewide maintenance contract to obtain a preferred rate
6. Build bulk refueling stations at locations with sufficient fuel consumptions
7. Deploy fleet telematics to enable capturing value of actions above
The implementation plan for these initiatives will feature initiative start and end dates, key decision
points, initiative owners, enablement activities, and change management practices needed to successfully
mobilize the organization. Key interdependencies between departments will also be highlighted to
proactively avoid roadblocks.
Arkansas’ progress toward achieving its future state fleet can be assessed across a collection of
operational capabilities and sub-capabilities based on peer benchmarks and best practices. This program
will need to be backed by a centralized, well-staffed fleet function, requiring statewide cooperation to
transition to a central fleet management system. In its future state, Arkansas will demonstrate maturity
across its guiding design capabilities.
SUMMARY OF CURRENT STATE FLEET ACTIVITY, OPERATIONS, AND PERFORMANCE
A. Current state fleet activity & benchmarking
Arkansas’ cabinet departments operate a fleet of 3,980 passenger vehicles costing ~$21M annually (see
below). The fleet is managed in DFA by one full-time fleet manager, one part-time administrator, and one
part-time assistant administrator.
PRELIMINARY
Overview of vehicle fleet
Executive departments1
(DOT & Universities out of scope) Fleet size2 Arkansas passenger vehicle fleet composition
# vehicles, as of March 2024
Public Safety 1,218
Corrections 809 Sedan / Hatchback / Coupe 1,687
Human Services 427 Passenger Truck 1,004
Agriculture 402 SUV / Crossover / Station Wagon 659
Parks, Heritage & Tourism 277 Van / Minivan 468
Finance & Admin 224 Commercial Truck 162
Commerce 171 Total 3,980 vehicles
Energy & Environment 149
Health 110 Estimated fleet costs
Military 71 2023
Education 55
Transformation & Shared Services 35 $7.2M $7.4M4 $6.2M $20.8M
Labor & Licensing 23 Depreciation3 Fuel Maintenance Total
Veteran’s Affairs 9
Total 3,980 vehicles
1. Department of Inspector General does not list any vehicles in SAVA
2. Excludes buses and specialty equipment which are generally not tracked in SAVA
3. Estimated with DFA fleet team based on average purchase cost of existing vehicles and five-year accounting depreciation period
4. Revised from previous estimate to remove Game & Fish fuel spend
Source: State Agency Vehicle Application (SAVA), DFA interviews 4
Exhibit 1
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Vehicles are procured, owned, managed, and maintained independently by department, with minimal
central oversight. Divisions manage the reservations for their cars individually, with no centralized
booking system or holistic fleet availability view. Because of this siloing, there is a wide distribution with
respect to utilization of vehicles, maintenance standards, and types of vehicles in the fleet. For example,
over 600 vehicles were driven less than 100 miles in 2023 and sit unused for months at a time.
When purchasing new vehicles, there is limited use of and long lead times on the statewide contract. As a
result, there is a large variability in purchase price. The average price for the 35 four- and five-person
sedans and compact utility vehicles purchased in 2023 was ~$30k, with a maximum of $45,600 and a 1st
quartile price of $25,400.
DRAFT AS OF APRIL 19, 2024
Fleet procurement: Buy lowest price comparable vehicles
Price dispersion for State-procured sedans & compact utility vehicles (2023 purchases), # of vehicles
6
1st Quartile Price: $25,400
4 4
3 3 3
2 2 2 2 2
1 1
<22
46+
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
Purchase price ($k)
Wide range of purchase prices2
1. Calculated annual savings represents average difference in depreciation over the next five years, and does not apply any savings on Department of Public Safety
procurement spend due to highly concentrated pricing on police vehicles and existing consolidation
2. Outliers removed from analysis 43
Source: OSP PO data
Exhibit 2
Additionally, the aging fleet is expensive to maintain, with the average maintenance cost more than
tripling between years 1-8 and years 9-20, from $0.07 to $0.25 per mile (see below). In most cases, fuel is
purchased from retail stations at retail rates, without bulk-fueling stations.
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PRELIMINARY
Fleet procurement: Optimize vehicle holding period
As Arkansas’s vehicle fleet ages… …its maintenance costs increase rapidly1
# Vehicles in AR’s fleet up to 20 years old Avg. annual maintenance cost for AR’s fleet
1 424 1 $119
2 84 2 $238
3 293 3 $554
4 281 4 $869
5 393 5 $1,185
6 298 6 $1,382
7 196 7 $1,580
Vehicle age
Vehicle age
8 324 8 $1,777
9 184 9 $1,975
10 250 10 $2,172
11 192 11 $2,369
12 151 12 $2,567
13 141 13 $2,764
14 141 14 $3,040
15 121 15 $3,316
16 135 16 $3,591
17 64 17 $3,867
18 89 18 $4,143
19 25 19 $4,419
20 36 20 $4,695
1. Average annual maintenance costs are calculated using SAVA data for vehicles that are 2, 5, 13, and 20 years old, selecting years based on sample size availability. Other annual maintenance costs are interpolated.
2. Sedans represent 42% of the existing vehicle fleet. Assumes a similar age distribution and operational parameters across vehicle classes.
Source: State Agency Vehicle Application (SAVA) 44
Exhibit 3
B. Synthesis of best practices
Top performing fleet functions optimize across procurement, fleet size, maintenance & fuel, and fleet
enablers. All four dimensions work together to yield operational, experiential, and financial improvements
for the fleet.
Top performing fleet functions optimize across four dimensions
PRELIMINARY
Increase asset Larger potential available
Improve vehicle
utilization by from heavy duty vehicles.
sourcing and optimize
improving fleet For example, a state DOT
age of fleet by
productivity through reduced their fleet size
assessing total cost of
Procurement Fleet right enhanced vehicle from 2013-2015 by ~2,800
ownership by asset
sizing sharing and underutilized assets,
class
realigning trips to the generating $17.5M in sales
lowest-cost that were reinvested in a
transportation option newer, more flexible fleet
Washington D.C. piloted
Improve fleet health a fleet share program
through performance with 58 vehicles at 8 sites
management, data &
Achieve lower costs Maintenance that utilized a web-based
Fleet analytics, incentives, reservation system. The
through enhanced
& fuel enablers telematics, org city eliminated 360
maintenance strategy,
design, governance, vehicles from its fleet,
bulk refueling, and 3rd
and change saving an estimated $1M
party engagement
management annually, according to its
fleet manager
Source: Expert interviews; DC example from https://www.govtech.com/budget-finance/green-initiatives-washington-dcs-vehicle-fleet.html 6
Exhibit 4
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October 9, 2024
Within procurement, best-in-class fleet management includes having a structured sourcing approach to
leverage negotiated prices while optimizing the age of the fleet to minimize total cost of ownership by
asset class. A centralized procurement approach leverages economies of scale to reduce prices and helps
standardize models across the fleet, allowing for streamlined maintenance later. Minimizing total cost of
ownership by optimizing the age of the fleet balances the increasing maintenance costs as vehicles age
with the up-front capex required to purchase a new vehicle and the potential sale price of the existing
vehicle. Evaluating these three values can minimize the total cost of ownership per vehicle for the state.
Best practice fleets also increase asset utilization and reduce costs by pooling vehicles and re-aligning
trips to the lowest-cost transportation option. For example, a state DOT reduced their fleet size from over
three years by ~2,800 underutilized assets, generating $17.5M in sales that were reinvested in a newer,
more flexible fleet. Washington D.C. piloted a fleet share program with 58 vehicles at 8 sites that utilized
a web-based reservation system. The city eliminated 360 vehicles from its fleet, saving an estimated $1M
annually, according to its fleet manager.
Enhanced maintenance, bulk refueling, and 3rd party engagement can streamline maintenance and fuel
processes. From a maintenance standpoint, an effective preventative maintenance program can both
reduce costs and improve availability for vehicles, as well as improving staff experience overall (due to
fewer emergency issues on the road). Bulk refueling can also improve experience from more
convenience, being able to refuel where the vehicles are stored, as well as reduce costs from purchasing at
wholesale rather than retail rates.
Performance management, data & analytics, incentives, telematics, org design, governance, and change
management ensure that the organization can empower fleet managers with the information and
capabilities to promote best-in-class fleet performance.
C. Diagnostic of optimization opportunities
Opportunities across procurement, right sizing, and maintenance & fueling, could reduce fleet spend by
$3M-5M annually, with an additional $1.0M-1.5M one-time revenue opportunity, while simultaneously
improving employee experience. These opportunities are supported by enablers which unlock the
necessary data and capabilities for a successful change program.
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October 9, 2024
Opportunities for fleet effectiveness and efficiency
Efficiency: 0 – 500K 500K-5M 5M+ Effectiveness & Experience1: decreases neutral increases
PRELIMINARY
Effectiveness/ Efficiencies One-time cost Enablers required to
Actions Experience1 ($M) / revenue ($M) capture value
C1.1 Buy lowest priced comparable vehicle 0.4 • Strengthen dedicated fleet team
Procurement within each vehicle class • Establish chargeback system to
C1.2 Optimize vehicle holding period 2.8 fund central vehicle pool
• Expand partnerships on state
C1.3 Create vehicle pools where there are 0 0.22 vehicle contracts to broaden
shared vehicle use cases in the same procurement options
Fleet right location, and sell remaining vehicles • Implement vehicle demand
sizing forecasting
C1.4 Realign trips to the lowest-cost mode of 1-1.5 0.6-0.8
transport (e.g., mileage reimbursement • Establish a governance
where ownership is not economical) approach that considers total
cost of ownership when
C1.5 Negotiate a statewide maintenance 0.1 procuring and retiring vehicles
contract to obtain a 2-3% lower rate • Implement a central vehicle
Maintenance
& Fuel reservation system
C1.6 Build bulk refueling at locations with 0.04 (0.1)
sufficient fuel consumption
Fleet C1.7 Deploy fleet telematics to enable actions (0.6-1.1)
enablers 1.2, 1.3, and 1.4
1. Employee and program effectiveness; citizen and employee experience
2. $405K in one-time revenue from vehicle sales, less $250K to develop central vehicle pool reservation system Total: ~$3M-5M ~$1M-1.5M
Source: Arkansas DFA fleet data; Arkansas State Government department data and interviews 8
Exhibit 5
Within procurement, optimizing the vehicle holding period could save $2.8M annually, with reduced
purchase price saving $0.4M annually.
For fleet right sizing, creating vehicle pools could yield $0.2M in one-time revenue ($0.4M in one-time
revenue from vehicle sales less $250k to develop reservation system). Additionally, the average sedan
must travel 16,100 miles per year for its operating cost per mile to be less than $0.52 / mi (the current
reimbursement rate for personal vehicle usage)1. In 2023, 795 non-pool vehicles were below this
threshold. Realigning trips to the lowest-cost mode of transport could save $1M-1.5M per year by
reimbursing the trips taken in 50-75% of the 795 vehicles rather than owning and operating them. Selling
795 vehicles could generate additional one-time revenue of $0.6M-0.8M depending on the sale value of
each.
Within maintenance and fuel, negotiating a statewide maintenance contract could obtain a 2-3% lower
rate, for $0.1M annual savings, while bulk refueling locations could save $0.04M annually.
VISION FOR FUTURE STATE
A. Guiding design principles for defining the future state
The future state for Arkansas fleet is based on four aspirational design principles for the fleet function:
1
Calculations based on current estimates of vehicle efficiency – as average age and quality of fleet changes,
operating costs should be re-evaluated
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October 9, 2024
Fleet future state: Guiding design principles
Experience Coordination Value Utilization
Improving user Fleet assets and Public funds are Fleet assets are
experience for state resources are responsibly utilized efficiently
employees (i.e., managed in an deployed to deliver (e.g., mileage basis)
modern, convenient, integrated fashion fleet and transport
safe vehicles) across the enterprise needs
Exhibit 6
Experience
50
With this transformation, the state will improve the user experience for employees using passenger
vehicles. This includes ensuring vehicles are safe and don’t break down, are modern & comfortable, and
are convenient to reserve and use. This could also include aspects such as telematics to show live vehicle
availability status and location.
Coordination
The Fleet function will adopt a holistic approach to fleet management, coordinating assets and resources
across departments and divisions to provide increased flexibility and economies of scale. This could
involve vehicle pooling, a statewide procurement or maintenance contract, and standardized vehicle
models.
Value
The state will deploy state dollars to accommodate fleet and transport needs while reducing overall travel
costs. This could include shifting trips to the lowest cost option that meets the needs of the trip (whether
mileage reimbursement for a personal vehicle or using a fleet vehicle).
Utilization
The Fleet function will promote utilization (e.g., mileage, availability, days used) of fleet assets to ensure
that vehicles meet their breakeven point and provide net benefit to the state. This ensures that money
invested in fleet vehicles is fiscally responsible and a net positive for the state.
These goals provide a holistic aspiration for what a best-in-class fleet function could achieve and of what
Arkansas could aspire to with its own fleet.
B. Defining the future state
In its future state, Arkansas will demonstrate maturity across the guiding design capabilities, with more
advanced capabilities and skills in four categories. This transformation will not only reduce the overall
cost of transportation for the state, but also improve the staff experience for travel by providing a more
predictable, higher-quality, and streamlined travel experience with fleet vehicles.
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October 9, 2024
Fleet optimization will focus on four categories
Category From… To… PRELIMINARY
Agency-focused decision making with fragmented data and uneven Integrated state-wide fleet with data-driven decision making,
Summary asset allocation centralized management, and empowered organization to
minimize total cost of travel
Procurement contract without volume discounts and aging fleet with Centralized purchasing on statewide procurement contract, with
Procurement high maintenance costs curated vehicle selection and total cost of ownership approach
High rate of under-utilized vehicles with limited fleet-wide visibility and High asset utilization through enhanced vehicle sharing and
Fleet right
department-specific allocation realigning trips to the lowest-cost transportation option to
sizing minimize total cost of travel
Maintenance and refueling sought out as-needed, often without Statewide maintenance contract negotiated with preferred rate
Maintenance
comparing costs
& Fuel Bulk refueling stations at locations with high fuel consumption
Fractured fleet data ecosystem with limited staff capacity for oversight Improved fleet health through performance management, data &
Fleet and highly manual processes analytics, automation, telematics, talent, governance, and change
enablers management, backed by a central, well-staffed fleet function
Limited inter-agency cooperation/coordination State-wide, continuous improvement mindset with focus on cost
Change
reduction and staff experience improvement
management
Exhibit 7
51
Procurement: In the future, the state’s approach to vehicle procurement will leverage scale benefits (i.e.,
greater negotiating power through large volume orders), with curated vehicle selection and total cost of
ownership approach. Through centralized procurement, the state of Arkansas will realize scale benefits by
negotiating its full spend with vendors and securing favorable terms given increased purchasing power.
Curated vehicle selection ensures that vehicles meet the needs of state employees while minimizing
potential for purchasing vehicles with excess features (and higher prices).
Taking a total cost of ownership (TCO) approach balances the up-front capex required to procure each
vehicle with the ongoing maintenance costs which increase over time with the age of the vehicle. Beyond
the absolute cost of the vehicles, a TCO approach leads to a more predictable retirement and procurement
cycle, which in turn allows the state to smooth the capex requirements for the fleet rather than having a
more “lumpy” cash requirement due to uneven vehicle ages. The more even capex needs allow for more
consistent and predicable capital planning.
Fleet right sizing: In the future, the state will benefit from high asset utilization through enhanced
vehicle sharing and realigning trips to the lowest-cost transportation option to minimize total cost of
travel. While fleet vehicles are cheaper per mile on a marginal cost basis than reimbursing personal
vehicle mileage, due to the high upfront cost for fleet vehicles, the fleet vehicles must maintain high
utilization (mileage) to remain the lowest total cost option overall.
Right sizing the fleet allows the total mileage driven to be concentrated among fewer vehicles, ensuring
that each vehicle remains above the breakeven mileage to be the lower cost option.
For vehicles below the breakeven threshold, the fleet function will evaluate the merits of selling the assets
and shifting trips to alternative options. Care will be taken to ensure that there are sufficient spare vehicles
for when vehicles break down, when employees do not have a personal vehicle (or have a vehicle that
does not fit the needs of the trip), or when trips have specific requirements beyond just travel. Reducing
the number of vehicles overall will further create savings for departments by reducing administrative
overhead and ongoing O&M costs.
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October 9, 2024
Maintenance and fuel: The fleet function will manage a statewide maintenance contract negotiated with
preferred rate and bulk refueling stations at locations with high fuel consumption. Similar to the proposed
procurement contract, a statewide maintenance contract will allow the state to leverage its purchasing
power and economies of scale to negotiate a preferential rate for maintenance compared to individual, ad
hoc maintenance procurement. Bulk refueling also provides economies of scale through purchasing fuel at
below retail rates where there is enough trip volume and concentration to offset the administrative cost.
Fleet management enablers: The fleet function will support improved fleet health through performance
management, data & analytics, incentives, telematics, org design, governance, and change management,
backed by a central, well-staffed fleet function. Underlying many of these capabilities will be a fleet
telematics system to enable data-driven decision making, providing live vehicle health information to
allow for proactive maintenance, etc. To effectively make use of the data provided by the telematics,
though, there will also be a central, well-staffed fleet function, empowered with the authority and
capabilities to manage the fleet. Improved organizational design, governance, change management, and
performance management drive the new ways of working and ensure value capture across the three other
categories.
To effectively administer and sustain these changes, the fleet function will organize around a new
operating model. Currently fleet activities have inconsistent approaches across departments, with some
central support but remain largely decentralized. As the new fleet management strategy is adopted,
activities will become more centralized as they are supported or governed by the newly empowered
central fleet function.
For example, vehicle procurement today is only centrally supported with distributed administration (i.e.,
there is a state-wide contract from which agencies can purchase, but there is no coordination or
negotiation to leverage purchasing power). Going forward, procurement will become more centralized,
with pooled vehicle procurement being centrally governed and administered to reduce average cost while
implementing vehicle demand management. Non-pooled vehicle procurement will be centrally governed
with distributed administration, giving agencies the ability to manage their own demand while still
providing benefits of scaled negotiation. Centralized capabilities and capacity will be established to
improve demand forecasting and needs identification. Additionally, vendor contract management will go
from a fully decentralized model, where departments contract and select vendors independently, to a fully
centralized model, leveraging the state’s full buying power to negotiate and manage relationships at the
state level.
In managing vehicles, both vehicle reservation/disposition and fleet performance management/enablers
(e.g., telematics and KPI tracking) are currently fully distributed, with no coordination between agencies.
However, in the future state they will be more centralized, with performance management/enablers being
fully centralized and managed by the fleet function, and non-pooled vehicle reservation/disposition
becoming centrally supported, where the central function provides the processes and platforms, but
demand/execution is managed by individual agencies. The new vehicle reservation/disposition for pooled
vehicles will be fully centralized, where the vehicles are operated and managed by the central function.
Given that current fleet sizes are authorized in state statute by legislation, efforts to create a centralized
pool of vehicles will require legislative action.
Maintenance for all vehicles today is largely decentralized with efforts for savings from a statewide
contract diminished by decentralized purchasing limited by subscale purchase volume. In the future,
pooled maintenance will be fully centralized, with non-pooled maintenance having central governance. In
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October 9, 2024
these cases, for non-pooled vehicles, departments will track and report the maintenance for their own
vehicles to promote central visibility into fleet quality and total costs.
Current and future-state operating model
Future-state goal Current state
PRELIMINARY More centralized More distributed
Shared services archetype
Centrally governed and Centrally governed, Central support, distributed Distributed governance and
Activities administered distributed administration administration administration
Vehicle procurement
(pooled)
Vehicle procurement (non-
pooled)2
Acquire
Demand forecasting &
needs identification1
Vendor contract
management
Vehicle reservation &
disposition (pooled)1
Vehicle reservation &
Manage disposition (non-pooled)2
Performance management
& enablers
Maintenance (pooled)
Maintain
Maintenance (non-pooled)2
1. Does not exist in current state
2. Non-pooled vehicles would include standard vehicles located in area without enough volume to justify pooling or specialized vehicles (e.g., law
enforcement) with specific availability/response/use requirements
22
Exhibit 8
EVALUATION OF FEASIBILITY AND IMPACT OF POTENTIAL INITIATIVES
A. Summary of interventions
Arkansas can capture up to $3M-5M in annual cost reduction from fleet optimization, in addition to $1M-
1.5M in one-time revenue, by implementing a set of 14 near-term and long-term initiatives (Exhibit 10).
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October 9, 2024
Capturing the value of fleet levers through “initiatives”
Fleet value levers How value could be captured from these levers
PRELIMINARY
Efficiencies
Actions ($M) Value levers are converted into a set of initiatives that…
C1.1 Buy lowest priced comparable vehicle
within each vehicle class
0.4
Procurement
Define the scope and objectives to drive impact
C1.2 Optimize vehicle holding period 2.8
C1.3 Create vehicle pools where there are
shared vehicle use cases in the same
0
Serve as the starting point for defining Arkansas
location, and sell remaining vehicles
Fleet right Forward milestones, planning resource
sizing C1.4 Realign trips to the lowest-cost mode of requirements, and determining measures of
transport (e.g., mileage reimbursement
1.2-1.9
success
where ownership is not economical)
C1.5 Negotiate a statewide maintenance
contract to obtain a 2-3% lower rate
0.1 Represent specific, measurable, actionable,
Maintenance relevant, and time-bound projects
& Fuel C1.6 Build bulk refueling at locations with
sufficient fuel consumption
0.04
Fleet C1.7 Deploy fleet telematics to enable actions
(0.6-1.1) Executing on these initiatives could enable Arkansas to
1.2, 1.3, and 1.4
enablers pursue, capture, and measure the value
Source: Arkansas DFA fleet data; Arkansas State Government
associated with each lever
department data and interviews, fleet visioning workshops
Total: ~$3M-5M
52
Exhibit 9
Initiatives address key opportunities for additional value capture across the four fleet value levers as well
as major enablers that span levers as identified by Arkansas DFA fleet data, Arkansas State Government
department data and interviews, and fleet visioning workshops.
Procurement: More effective and efficient procurement has the potential to unlock up to ~$3.2M in value
for the state through standardized vehicle specifications at purchase and optimizing the vehicle holding
period. The state will pursue three initiatives to understand the future demand for vehicles, standardize
and centralize procurement to leverage economies of scale in rate negotiations, and optimize the holding
period to minimize TCO.
Fleet right sizing: Right sizing the state’s fleet has the potential to unlock up to ~$1.9M in cost savings
and a further ~$1.3M in one-time revenue from vehicle sales. The state will adopt five initiatives focused
on fleet right sizing, including establishing vehicle pools to improve utilization, realigning trips to the
lowest-cost mode of travel, maximizing revenue from vehicle sales, and developing an integrated vehicle
reservation system.
Maintenance and fuel: The state expects to unlock up to ~$0.14M in recurring annual efficiencies
through more rigorous maintenance and fuel management. The state will pursue four initiatives,
summarized below, focus on negotiating statewide maintenance contracts, implementing preventative
maintenance, and increasing use of bulk refueling stations.
Fleet enablers: To support the broader portfolio of initiatives on an ongoing basis, the fleet function will
pursue two enabling initiatives to implement telematics to drive and track fleet optimizations and build
capabilities in the central fleet management function.
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October 9, 2024
PRELIMINARY
Fleet initiatives for the near term and long term
Initiatives are tactical actions that pursue fleet value levers: QW “Quick Win” initiative
# Initiative name # Initiative name
602 Standardize vehicle specifications and consolidate procurement spend 610 QW: Negotiate a statewide maintenance contract and utilize OEM-
Maintenance & Fuel
Procurement
across asset classes (C1.1) dealer relationships to increase vehicle availability (C1.5)
603 QW: Implement vehicle demand forecasting (C1.1)
611 Undertake lean optimization of maintenance shops
604 Optimize vehicle holding period (e.g., assess total cost of ownership for
612 QW: Institute preventative maintenance cycle for asset
key asset classes, instituting regulatory guidelines and governance
approach to support retiring vehicles at the optimal age) (C1.2)
613 QW: Open existing bulk refueling stations to adjacent departments /
605 Maximize fleet trade in value by monitoring used vehicle indices and divisions
adopting auction best practices (C1.2, 1.3, 1.4)
615 Invest in expanded use of fleet telematics to optimize fleet operations
Fleet right sizing
enablers
606 Create vehicle pools (e.g., size potential pools, establish chargeback
cutting
Cross-
and improve safety (1.7)
system to fund central vehicle pool, embed telematics on pool vehicles,
and implement a reservation system) (C1.3)
616 Build capabilities in central fleet management function
607 QW: Sell underutilized vehicles (C1.3)
608 QW: Create minimum viable tool to realign trips to lowest-cost mode of
transport (e.g., mileage reimbursement vs pool vehicle) (C1.4)
609 Develop integrated vehicle reservation system (C1.3, 1.4)
Source: Arkansas DFA fleet data; Arkansas State Government department data and interviews, fleet visioning workshops
53
Exhibit 10
B. Prioritized initiatives
Initiatives are prioritized according to expected annual impact, feasibility to execute, and timeline to
implementation. Initiatives that are easy to execute, or “familiar”, to the organization, are considered
quick wins and have been mapped to a near-term implementation horizon. Similarly, initiatives that
require additional support, coordination, or more time to execute have been mapped to longer horizons,
depending on their level of complexity and pathway to execution. This helps build momentum in the near
term for the change program while allowing the team to still capture the full value of all initiatives over
time.
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October 9, 2024
PRELIMINARY
Fleet initiatives for the near term and long term
Captured in another
Analysis of prioritized initiatives by familiarity and value capture ## Initiative ID [-] One-time cost [+] One-time revenue *
workstream
Annual impact: Enabler 0 - $50K $50K - $500K $500K - $1.5M $1.5M - $5M $5M+
Familiarity
Familiar 610
607
[-]
604
“We can do this 615 602
right now” [+] 609 612
608
[+] 613
Unfamiliar 616
[+]
“We can do this 605 603
611
with support”
606
[+]
Uncertain
“We don’t know if
this can be done”
Near term Medium term Long Term
(2024) (Jan 2025 - June 2026) Beyond June 2026
Time
Source: Arkansas DFA fleet data; Arkansas State Government department data and interviews, fleet visioning workshops 26
Exhibit 11
IMPLEMENTATION AND CHANGE MANAGEMENT PLAN
A. Pathways to future state
As the fleet management function evolves into its future state through the implementation of prioritized
initiatives, it will progress across 3 implementation phases:
Phase 1: DFA will pursue quick wins to capture immediate opportunities for value. Specifically,
initiatives to right-size the fleet and consolidate underutilized and/or high-maintenance-cost vehicles will
unlock rapid cost reduction. DFA will further test and refine initiatives before broader roll-out to better
define standardized vehicle classes and lay the groundwork for additional initiatives going forward.
Phase 2: DFA will begin building organizational capabilities to enable the implementation of additional
initiatives. This includes building the capacity (whether internally or using out-sourcing) to manage the
fleet effectively and implementing data-driven planning and decision-making processes (e.g., total cost of
travel approach, trade-in value, proactive maintenance).
Phase 3: DFA will implement remaining initiatives, including a centralized model for procurement,
fueling, maintenance, and vehicle pooling. In this phase, DFA will deploy expanded fleet telematic
capabilities to track utilization and estimate value capture across other initiatives.
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October 9, 2024
Optimization will be phased across three strategic horizons
PRELIMINARY
Capture full value
Build organizational
capabilities
Strategic horizon Fleet right-sizing
quick wins
Description Initial no-regrets right sizing Build out or outsource Centralized model for
and consolidation of organization with capacity procurement, fueling, and
underutilized and highest effectively manage fleet maintenance
maintenance cost vehicles Implement data-driven Fully developed vehicle
MVP vehicle pooling pilot in planning and decision pooling process
Little Rock making (total cost of travel Holistic fleet telematics to
View of standardized approach, trade-in value, track value capture
vehicles for future-state proactive maintenance)
Enablers Centralized pooling, administration outsourcing, accountability mechanisms/contract management
Exhibit 12
49
B. Sequencing over horizons and rollout plan
To realize future state outcomes, Arkansas will organize its initiatives and implementation activities into
an initiative phasing plan. This phasing allows for incremental, not overwhelming, improvement and
growth in capabilities for staff and the fleet organization. It also provides an opportunity for the
organization to apply learnings from previous phases to iterate on change management, reprioritize
initiatives, and improve implementation plans for later phases.
PRELIMINARY
Horizons of fleet excellence
Continuously reprioritize long
Capture quick wins Execute high-value long-term initiatives
tail & emerging initiatives
Initia- Negotiate a statewide vehicle Invest in expanded use of fleet telematics to optimize fleet operations Undertake lean optimization of
tives maintenance contract and improve safety maintenance shops
Implement vehicle demand Build capabilities in central fleet management function
forecasting Develop integrated vehicle reservation system
Sell or transfer underutilized Optimize vehicle holding period (e.g., assess total cost of ownership for
vehicles key asset classes, instituting regulatory guidelines and governance
Institute preventative maintenance approach to support retiring vehicles at the optimal age)
cycle for key asset classes Standardize vehicle purchase orders and consolidate procurement
Open existing bulk refueling spend across asset classes
stations to adjacent departments Create vehicle pools (e.g., size potential pools, establish chargeback
Create minimum viable tool to system to fund central vehicle pool, embed telematics on pool vehicles,
realign trips to lowest-cost mode and implement a reservation system)
of transport (e.g., mileage Maximize fleet trade in value by monitoring used vehicle indices and
reimbursement vs pool vehicle) adopting auction best practices
Owner- Owner: Functional PMs Owner: Functional PM and designated initiative owners Owner: Functional PM and
ship & Management: Weekly functional Management: Arkansas Forward project management organization Arkansas Forward PMO
Time- PM check-ins and eventually the (PMO) regular weekly and monthly meetings Management: Arkansas Forward
line Arkansas Forward project Timing: Value capture efforts begin after strategic plans are revised project management organization
management organization (PMO) within Wave 1 departmental initiative prioritization effort (PMO) ongoing reprioritization
Timing: Value capture efforts exercise
begin now Timing: Ongoing over length of
Arkansas Forward implementation
Source: Arkansas DFA fleet data; Arkansas State Government department data and interviews 27
Exhibit 13
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October 9, 2024
The plan organizes activities into a series of interim phases spanning over the next ~12 months and
categorizes activities by opportunity type with callouts for key timeline considerations, including key
owners, decisions, milestones, and anticipated timeline to implementation. As Arkansas progresses across
implementation phases, it can assess its performance relative to its future state goals, anticipate
roadblocks, proactively schedule meetings for key decision points, and identify opportunities for
additional opportunity-enhancing projects.
Exhibit 14
C. Change management plan
To facilitate a successful mobilization and mitigate potential risks, the state will implement a series of
efforts to improve adoption of the new approach and business processes. These processes and practices
will help manage impacted stakeholders, build buy-in, and reduce friction in implementation.
Fleet leaders will manage several potential change management risks including challenges building
capabilities and capacity to administer the new approach, as well as understanding by and willingness of
departments to adopt the new approach. For example, the state may not have yet established an approach
and practice of negotiating effectively with manufacturers and distributors/dealers during procurement,
while at the same time, agencies may resist the smaller selection of standardized vehicles. In right sizing
the fleet, agencies may resist pooling of vehicles and want to keep low-utilization vehicles or require clear
explanations of potential travel reimbursement options. For maintenance, agencies may not adhere to the
preventative maintenance schedule.
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October 9, 2024
Successful change programs address all four levers to influence
behaviors
1 2
Understanding & conviction Reinforcement with
Change story formal mechanisms
Ongoing, 2-way communications
1 2 Language and rituals
Structures and systems
Processes
“I choose Incentives
to change my
mindset and
behavior if …” 4 3
4 3 Role modeling Confidence &
Senior leader/senior team skill-building
role modeling Technical and relational skills
Symbolic acts Field-and-forum programs
Influencing of leaders Recruitment of new talent pool
Successful change programs are 8 times more likely to use all four areas of behavioral influences than just one
38
Exhibit 15
Across each category, the state will undertake measured efforts to ensure the change program is
successful.
● Understanding and conviction: Department executives and their fleet leaders will be encouraged to
message the change to employees while at the same time gathering feedback and insights from
employees to improve the program. For example, this would include an education campaign on the
new reservation system and process, feedback mechanism such as focus groups, and sharing the
progress on increasing utilization and reduced costs.
● Formal reinforcement mechanisms: The fleet function will develop the new reservation process as
well as the exceptions process for vehicle purchases outside of standard specs. It will also include
items such as tracking KPIs to track progress (e.g., travel spend per mile, maintenance spend per
vehicle, purchase price per vehicle, etc.).
● Confidence & skill building: Training programs for the new processes, for vendor management and
negotiation, and business intelligence for fleet employees will create continuous improvement
mindset and empower fleet employees to succeed in their new responsibilities.
● Role modeling: The organization will ensure that leaders are demonstrating new activities and
actions to show their support. For example, this would include ensuring that leaders use the new
pooled vehicles as much as possible.
D. Implications for fleet processes and organization
While implementing its initiative phasing plan, Arkansas will need to monitor interdependencies between
the fleet optimization, other domains within the Transformation and Shared Services department (e.g., IT,
Procurement, Real Estate), and other State of Arkansas departments and proactively mitigate disruptions.
Anticipated interdependencies include:
● Fleet geographic distribution changes as real estate consolidation occurs
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October 9, 2024
● Real estate for storage/pooling locations & parking availability for the pools
● New IT systems for vehicle pooling, reservations, telemetry, etc.
● Procurement involvement with fuel, vehicle purchase, and maintenance contract development and
selection
● Funding mechanisms for the pooled vehicles and necessary changes to existing vehicle funding to
enable pooling
Beyond interdependencies, further investigation will be done to understand what policies, promulgated
documents, etc. may need to be updated to reflect the new procedures to ensure compliance and
effectiveness.
Finally, the increased scope and responsibilities of the more centralized fleet function will necessitate a
commensurate growth in the personnel assigned to the function. The 2 FTE2 currently assigned to Fleet
from DFA will likely not have sufficient capacity to take on the increased workload for the new operating
model, despite anticipated increases to efficiency from improved process digitization and automation and
overall reduction in fleet size. We expect to expand the number of fleet dedicated FTE to ~3. Given the
increased use of data and analytics, this would likely encompass two fleet manager roles, along with one
position more focused on data analysis.
As part of the change program and formalization of the fleet management organization, state leaders will
also investigate whether DFA is the best owner for the fleet function. Many peer states maintain both their
fleet management and real estate management organization in the same cabinet agency, primarily a
Department of Administration or of Finance, or even the same group/division within the agency.
Currently, Arkansas’ real estate group sits within TSS, while the fleet management function exists within
DFA.
2
Includes two personal at 0.5 capacity, and 1 personnel at full capacity (0.5 + 0.5 +1.0 = 1.0 FTE)
17
October 9, 2024
ARKANSAS FORWARD: STRATEGIC REAL ESTATE PLAN
THE ARKANSAS FORWARD IMPERATIVE
Governor Sanders launched Arkansas Forward with the aspiration for the State of Arkansas to set the
standard for government efficiency and effectiveness through enterprise-wide operational change.
Achieving such an aspiration will include delivery of better state government services, at less cost, for all
Arkansans. To do so, state employees, teams, and departments will need to work together in new ways
and with new skills. Delivering Arkansas Forward’s potential, therefore, will require optimizing the
state’s real estate portfolio, fulfilling organizational and citizen needs quickly and efficiently.
For these reasons, Governor Sanders has called for a redesign of Arkansas state government’s approach to
real estate management, focused on improving user experience, coordination, community, and utilization.
A new approach, partnering with agency leaders to identify and fulfill real estate needs, can foster an
efficient and effective real estate portfolio for Arkansas.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The Arkansas Forward effort has developed the state’s first comprehensive view of its combined owned
and leased real estate portfolio. The state has a currently documented real estate portfolio of ~11.8M
square feet, ~5.5M of which is office space. 3.3M square feet of office space are in Little Rock (319
SF/FTE), 2.2M are outside Little Rock (279 SF/FTE), and statewide buildings do not currently provide
“one stop shopping” for citizen services.
Analyses and departmental input have highlighted several effectiveness and efficiency challenges:
● Employee experience in many buildings is suboptimal and may hinder talent attraction, retention, and
collaboration
● Little Rock has roughly double the footprint required to achieve SF/FTE benchmarks
● Departments are not required or encouraged to share information about space availability or land use
with DBA
● Flexible work policies are inconsistent and unclear across State government
Given these challenges, Arkansas can consolidate and modernize its portfolio to provide world-class work
environments and citizen service centers. Real Estate functions have out-sized impact on employee
experience and are often one of the largest expenses after employee compensation. Workplace flexibility
and experience are critical for top talent who have access to and demand for remote and distributed roles.
Office space savings can be significant by aligning flexible work policies with location and workplace
strategies.
The analysis shows an estimated potential annual savings opportunity of $15-25M through several
initiatives:
● Increasing occupancy in Little Rock office space, exiting leases or selling owned property
● Consolidating non-Little Rock office space within and between towns
● Selling or repurposing underutilized State-owned lands
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October 9, 2024
● Centralizing some facilities and operations management processes, including implementing
preventative maintenance practices
To enable the modernization and continual strategic management of the state’s real estate portfolio, DBA
will need to be enabled with the right systems and capabilities to play a guiding role in sourcing,
designing, and operating the portfolio.
SUMMARY OF CURRENT STATE REAL ESTATE PORTFOLIO, OPERATIONS, AND PERFORMANCE
A. Current real estate portfolio and pain points
Arkansas currently owns or leases 11.8 million square feet of space across the state. Of that, 5.5 million
square feet are used as office space: 3.3m SF in Little Rock and 2.2m SF outside Little Rock. Within
Little Rock, 2.4m SF (~75%) of office space is owned, while outside Little Rock, 80% of office space is
leased. From a strategic perspective, there is little overarching or long-term analysis to optimize the
portfolio as a whole for the needs of the state. Many buildings are operating at only partial occupancy,
with spaces not optimized to the current way of working or needs of the organization. This is not only
fiscally inefficient, but also can create cultural issues within organizations as well. For example, in
interviews with PHT staff, they noted that physical separation may result in inconsistent approaches
across divisions for services like fleet and IT.
Of Arkansas’ 81 DHS County Operations sites, 71 have more square footage per person than the
estimated target. Among offices at or below the space threshold (e.g., Conway), there are undesirable
configurations – for example, three desks in a closed room intended as single office space, rather than
open flexible desks.
PRELIMINARY
Current documented real estate portfolio
Addressable Arkansas executive branch real estate as of 2023 Usage breakdown by specific categories
SF, millions SF, millions
Leased Owned
3.3
0.8
11.8
1.6 4.5 2.2
0.3 0.2
4.7
4.3
5.5 2.4 1.8
2.6
7.1
2.8
0.4
Total SF nknown /
U Total Subleases to S ubleases Non-office Office Little Rock Outside LR
undocumented documented State entities2 to non-State uses4
SF 1 entities3 C2.1 C2.2
1.Does not include higher education, correctional facilities, non-Little Rock PHT facilities, non-executive constitutional offices, and Justice Building (listed as
owned by TSS as financial passthrough to Justice). Higher education leases represent 1.7M SF for which ownership data is not available.
2.This does not include higher education subleases to executive departments, captured through lessee contract data.
3.Includes cities, philanthropic orgs (e.g., Red Cross), private businesses (e.g., Mullenix & Associates). Also includes leases for communications tower space
4.Includes youth services, developmental disability services, dorms, storage, police and military training facilities, land.
Source: Arkansas Division of Building Authority, Arkansas Cabinet Departments 4
Exhibit 1
2
October 9, 2024
Much of the data regarding leases, property, personnel, and space design are either not collected, collected
irregularly, or collected manually, making it difficult to track, manage, and evaluate the portfolio as a
whole.
Real estate data mapping
Collection: Not collected Collected irregularly via ad-hoc Collected regularly but not automatically Complete and accurate in real
efforts updated time
PRELIMINARY
Integration: Not integrated or not Ad-hoc integration for one-off Automatic linkage to some other real Automatic linkage to all other
collected projects estate datasets / systems data via centralized system
Data Data Update Data Who manages the
category Subcategory collection frequency integration data? Opportunities unlocked by improving data management
Buildings Properties leased 2x per year DBA • Enable agencies to leverage available space across existing
government facilities instead of initiating new leases
• Actively manage termination /sale possibilities to support business
cases for consolidation
Properties owned Upon request by Departments,
Governor Governor’s Office
Land Land owned Upon request by Land Commission, • Identify opportunities to sell / repurpose unused land
Land Commission Counties, departments • Support business cases for build-to-suit facilities on owned land
Personnel People assigned to Never OPM • Verify headcount/occupancy demand to size real estate needs
location • Measure attrition and engagement by location
People using a N/A N/A • Further right-size demand for space (e.g., support desk-sharing)
location • Identify groups that collaborate regularly
• Support consolidation and restacking opportunities based on
Space Floor plans Unknown Leased – DBA space type availability
design Owned – Departments
• Benchmark current space against new and future standards
• Improve future design and construction cost estimates
Space utilization N/A N/A
• Inform future design standards based on what is used/not used
• Inform cross-site hoteling and reinforce policy for assigned seats
Source: State of Arkansas Division of Building Authority, State of Arkansas Office of Personnel Management, State of Arkansas executive departments, expert 5
interviews
Exhibit 2
B. Synthesis of best practices
When designing and managing a real estate portfolio, there are four primary aspects to ensure workplace
efficiency, effectiveness, and experience for both the employees and citizens as reflected below.
Real estate value sources
PRELIMINARY
Workplace efficiency, effectiveness, and
experience (employee and customer)
Source Design/Build Run
Following standard guidelines, decisions are Building designs and occupancy plans (e.g., Vendor partnerships and service levels respond
made to build, buy, or lease the appropriate seating arrangements) directly connect to new to changes in office utilization, leveraging
amount (and type) of space. Statewide flexible ways of working and talent strategies to technology to improve occupant experience,
space usage reduces footprint requirement. increase agility, reduce risk, and optimize costs. reduce carbon footprint, and improve energy
efficiency.
Centralized real estate function with executive and policy support to influence change;
interconnected data systems linking IT, HR, and real estate information
Source: Expert interviews
Exhibit 3 67
3
October 9, 2024
Sourcing: Following standard guidelines/criteria (e.g., transportation access, amenities, and potential for
hybrid work models), decisions will be made to build, buy, or lease the appropriate amount (and type) of
space. Statewide flexible space usage will reduce footprint requirements. A master plan with defined
portfolio objectives will guide the overall sourcing approach. Creating a local master plan typically
follows a 5-step process:
1. Assess current owned and leased office locations (e.g., function, employees assigned utilization)
2. Define Little Rock portfolio objectives (e.g., reducing real estate costs, improving workspace
utilization, increasing downtown economic density/activity)
3. Collect and analyze data to inform consolidation decisions (e.g., employee distribution, commute
times, real estate costs, remote work trends)
4. Develop criteria for selecting consolidated office location(s), considering factors like
transportation access, amenities, and potential for hybrid work models
5. Execute transition plan, responding to changes in flexible work policies and monitoring progress
Designing/building: Building designs and occupancy plans (e.g., seating arrangements) will connect
directly to new ways of working and talent strategies to increase agility, reduce risk, and optimize costs.
Best-in-class real estate design practices include:
● Directly connecting future of work and/or flexible working policies with real estate portfolio
● Reducing office space based on lower daily utilization from increased digitization, mobility, and
flexible work
● Implementing and/or expanding desk sharing programs to maximize utilization and reduce moves,
adds, and changes
● Revising workplace guidelines to standardize space types, planning principles, and target space
allocation
● Implementing new collaboration and building technologies to maximize workplace mobility and
digital collaboration
Running: Service levels will respond to changes in office utilization, leveraging technology to improve
occupant experience. This could include best practices such as:
● Consolidating suppliers, benchmark prices from RFP bids received
● Reducing demand with optimized, reactive/by demand processes
● Increasing replacement periods, setting material use guides, assessing capacity
● Using preventative maintenance and incident management
● Optimizing required building services levels over time (e.g., increased natural light)
Organization: Centralizing the real estate function will provide executive and policy support to influence
change, as well as interconnected data systems linking IT, HR, and real estate information.
In terms of outcomes, the US GSA benchmark is 135 useable SF/person for new offices with 50+ people;
however, given limited convertibility of existing buildings owned by the state and potential additional
needs within state organizations, 200 SF per FTE represents a realistic near-term goal for the state within
Little Rock, and 225 SF/FTE outside of Little Rock.
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October 9, 2024
C. Portfolio optimization opportunities
Benchmarking analysis revealed $15M-25M in savings opportunity across four dimensions.
Consolidating Little Rock office space could save $10M-20M annually by increasing occupancy in Little
Rock office space from ~320 SF/FTE to 200 SF/FTE and exiting leases and/or selling buildings.
Optimizing the statewide network could save $3M-6M annually by consolidating non-Little Rock office
space within and between towns to reach 225 SF/FTE and exiting leases and/or selling buildings. For both
categories, final savings depend on the ultimate square foot per FTE achieved and profile of buildings
removed (i.e., cost relative to portfolio average). Improving land use by selling or repurposing
underutilized state-owned lands could yield additional efficiencies but requires better data quality to
quantify. Operations and management improvement by applying best practices across facility
management and operations (e.g., preventative maintenance contracting, centralization of vendor
management) would generate procurement savings, and is analyzed in the procurement workstream.
Across these four dimensions, there are additional potential major actions required to capture value. First
is increasing availability and integration of building data (e.g., allocated FTEs, utilization, space design).
Data availability and accuracy is a key enabler to understand the current state of the portfolio and space
utilization, and to track impacts from initiatives as they are implemented. Additionally, DBA should be
empowered to manage or meaningfully influence real estate portfolio decisions. An empowered,
centralized RE function can help ensure a cohesive strategy, fiscal responsibility of state spending, and
consistency across the portfolio. Finally, securing senior state government leadership sponsorship,
including Governor’s office and secretaries will be important to ensure full organizational support.
Real estate optimization strategies across four dimensions
Efficiency: 0 – 500K 500K-5M 5M+ Effectiveness & Experience1: decreases neutral increases
PRELIMINARY
Effectiveness/ Efficiencies One-time costs Potential major actions
Levers / more detailed approach Experience1 ($M) / revenue ($M) required to capture value
C2.1 Increase occupancy in Little Rock • Increase availability and
Consolidate office space from ~330 SF/FTE to 200 10-20M (10-21M) integration of building data
Little Rock SF/FTE and exit leases and/or sell (e.g., allocated FTEs,
office space buildings
utilization, space design)
C2.2 Consolidate non-Little Rock office • Empower DBA to manage or
Optimize 3-6M (8-16M) meaningfully influence real
space within and between towns to reach
statewide 225 SF/FTE and exit leases and/or sell estate portfolio decisions
network buildings
• Secure senior state
C2.3 Sell or repurpose underutilized State- government leadership
Improve land owned lands Better data required sponsorship, including
& facility use Governor’s office and
C2.4 Apply best practices across facility
secretaries
management and operations (e.g.,
Analyzed in procurement
Operations &
preventative maintenance contracting, workstream
management
centralization of vendor management)
Total: ~15-25M ~(20-35M)
1. Employee and program effectiveness; citizen and employee experience
Source: Arkansas Division of Building Authority, Arkansas Cabinet Departments, US General Services Administration 14
Exhibit 4
5
October 9, 2024
VISION FOR FUTURE STATE
A. Guiding design principles for defining the future state
The state’s future vision for its real estate portfolio aims to improve performance across four strategic
design principles:
Real estate future state: Guiding design principles
Experience Coordination Community Utilization
Design and use of State assets are Master planning Square footage is
spaces are managed to managed in an processes to progress optimally utilized
be “fit-for-purpose” integrated fashion the state’s priorities according to employee
and goals beyond the and citizen needs
inherent needs of the
spaces
Exhibit 5
Experience
66
The state will improve experience through the design and use of spaces to be “fit-for-purpose”, with the
right mix of public vs private space, communal areas, conference rooms, etc. to improve citizen and staff
experience, with a coherent co-location model for agencies and flexible working policies for employees.
Coordination
The state will promote integrated management of state assets such that there is centralized management
across the state government. This will help leverage economies of scale, create “one-stop shops” for
citizens, and ensure consistency of experience across spaces. This interagency coordination will increase
statewide visibility of utilization, availability, and needs across locations to ensure efficient, responsible
use of funds.
Community
The state will foster community via a master planning process that ensures a cohesive portfolio which
progresses the state’s priorities and goals beyond the inherent needs of the spaces. This could include
aspects such as economic development, transit connections, partnerships with educational institutions, or
making spaces available to the public. It should be noted that the impacts on and needs of the local
community differ at the micro level, not only just rural vs urban, but even potentially neighborhood by
neighborhood. Care must be taken to ensure that the actions taken and decisions made are in alignment
with those needs.
6
October 9, 2024
Utilization
The state will optimize employee and citizen use of square footage through location consolidation or
space reconfiguration in alignment with current and future needs. This will occur through two
mechanisms. First is consolidating employees among fewer locations, such that offices are fuller, and a
higher density is reached. This allows for empty offices to be sold or vacated. It also allows for increased
collaboration within the remaining spaces, as they are more vibrant and active. Second is reconfiguring
the spaces such that the higher density remains comfortable. This means minimizing wasted/unusable
space such that the desks and workspaces available in the office remain convenient and comfortable
despite the higher density.
These four tenets provide a holistic aspiration for what a best-in-class real estate function could achieve
and of what Arkansas could aspire to with its own real estate portfolio.
B. Defining the future state
In its future state, Arkansas will reduce the overall real estate cost for the state, simultaneously improving
the staff and citizen experience by providing a more modern, approachable, and convenient environment
for all stakeholders. It will do so via a centralized, coordinated strategy for real estate assets including
integrated vision for efficient utilization.
Real estate optimization will focus on four categories
PRELIMINARY
Category From… To…
Limited central authority or coordinated action across real estate Centralized, coordinated strategy for real estate assets including integrated vision
Summary portfolio for efficient utilization
Consolidate 3.3M SF of office space across Little Rock with ~330 SF/FTE and no Little Rock master plan with portfolio objectives (e.g., reducing real estate costs,
master plan to drive office location, space allocation, or department improving workspace utilization, increasing downtown economic density/activity)
Little Rock office
location strategy and criteria for selecting consolidated office location(s)
space
Optimize Office space spread across state, with wide distribution in SF/FTE Consolidated spaces within and between towns to reach 225 SF/FTE, with shared
statewide and physical layout (e.g., private offices being used for multiple workspaces and departments and divisions sharing citizen meeting space,
network people) conference room space, and potentially office space
Suboptimal employee experience in many buildings, which may Modernized office portfolio to provide world-class work environments and citizen
Improve land & hinder talent attraction, retention, and collaboration service centers
facility use
Lack of “one point of contact” citizen services for state buildings
Inconsistent and unclear flexible work policies are across state Centralized facilities and operations management processes, including
government implementing preventative maintenance
Operations &
management Departments not mandated or encouraged to share information about DBA empowered with the right systems, KPIs, and capabilities to play a guiding role
space availability or land use with DBA, fragmented/imprecise data in sourcing, designing, and operating the state’s real estate portfolio (e.g.,
tracking systems for building utilization interconnected data systems linking IT, HR, and real estate information)
Change Bespoke, agency-specific mindset towards real estate management Comprehensive, portfolio-wide mindset, with decisions on assets and utilization
aligned to a common real estate strategy and objectives
management
Source: Arkansas Division of Building Authority, Arkansas Cabinet Departments, Arkansas Office of Personnel Management 18
Exhibit 6
Consolidating Little Rock office space
In the future state, the real estate function will have a Little Rock master plan with portfolio objectives
(e.g., reducing real estate costs, improving workspace utilization, increasing downtown economic
density/activity) and criteria for selecting consolidated office location(s).
This could occur across three horizons: first, consolidating employees between offices to improve
colocation and empty unneeded spaces; second, normalizing remote and flexible work policies across
7
October 9, 2024
state agencies to establish baseline space needs for the future; and third, investing in physical spaces to
improve space efficiency and staff/citizen experience.
Optimizing the statewide network
The state will consolidate spaces within and between towns to reach 225 SF/FTE, with shared workspaces
and departments and divisions sharing citizen meeting space, conference room space, and potentially
office space. Because the needs and considerations of these more rural areas are distinct from the more
urban Little Rock, the future state of the non-Little Rock portfolio may also be distinct from the Little
Rock portfolio.
Improving land and facility use
The office portfolio will be modernized to provide world-class work environments and citizen service
centers. This will help attract and retain talent as well as improve the CX for both citizens and employees.
Operations and management
In the future, facilities and operations management processes will be centralized, including improved
preventative maintenance. For owned properties, this could involve an in-house function, or outsourcing
to a property management company. DBA will be empowered with the right systems, KPIs, and
capabilities to play a guiding role in sourcing, designing, and operating the state’s real estate portfolio
(e.g., interconnected data systems linking IT, HR, and real estate information) while also tracking the
impact of the transformation over time.
To effectively administer and sustain these changes, the DBA will organize around a new operating
model. These activities currently exist on a spectrum from fully distributed to fully centralized, with
varying amounts of central support between the two extremes. Across the board, activities will become
more centralized as they are supported or governed by the future-state DBA.
For example, when acquiring new space, currently DBA supports departments with standard leases and
signature authority while departments find suitable space on their own. In the future, sourcing will be
centrally governed and administered, with DBA sourcing the space for the departments. Additionally,
purchasing real estate will move from a fully distributed model, with no central oversight or management,
to a standardized, centrally managed process, where DBA provides guidance and oversight, but individual
departments run the process themselves.
For day-to-day management, DBA will retain full control of owning/managing the DBA portfolio. With
the non-DBA portfolio, DBA will provide standardized guidelines, processes, etc., but individual
departments will remain in charge of running the day-to-day operations. Additionally, property
management and maintenance will become slightly more centralized, with statewide vendor contracts
with standard SLAs and responsiveness terms available to all departments.
For tracking the portfolio, the forecast/utilization analysis will be established centrally, where DBA
manages and owns the forecast/analysis as a whole, but individual departments are responsible for
providing utilization and other demand forecast data to DBA. Additionally, DBA will centrally track and
8
October 9, 2024
manage the portfolio, its utilization, and availability1 tracking, relative to the current state where there is
no standard tracking across departments.
Current and future-state operating model
Future-state goal Current state
PRELIMINARY More centralized More distributed
Shared services archetype
Centrally governed and Centrally governed, Central support, distributed Distributed governance and
Activities administered distributed administration administration administration
Source new buildings for
lease
Manage and sign leases
Acquire
Purchase real estate
Own/manage real estate
(DBA portfolio)
Own/manage real estate
Manage (non-DBA portfolio)
Property management &
maintenance
Space need forecasts /
utilization analysis
Portfolio, utilization, and
Track
availability tracking
Stakeholder management
Note: Activities only apply to divisions where real estate is a supporting asset. Divisions where real estate plays a programmatic role (e.g., Corrections, State
Parks) remain under full purview of their respective divisions.
29
Exhibit 7
EVALUATION OF FEASIBILITY AND IMPACT OF POTENTIAL INITIATIVES
A. Summary of interventions
Arkansas can capture up to $15M-25M in value by implementing a set of 22 near-term and long-term real
estate initiatives (Exhibit 9).
1
Availability refers to the amount of time a vehicle is available for use, regardless of whether it is used or not. (i.e.,
365 days less planned and unplanned days the car was unavailable due to maintenance)
9
October 9, 2024
Capturing the value of real estate levers through “initiatives”
Real estate value levers How value could be captured from these levers
Actions Efficiency Value levers are converted into a set of initiatives that…
C2.1
Increase occupancy in Little Rock
Consolidate office space from ~320 SF/FTE to 200 $10-20M
Little Rock SF/FTE and exit leases and/or sell Define the scope and objectives to drive impact
office space buildings
C2.2 Consolidate non-Little Rock office
Optimize space within and between towns to reach $3-6M Serve as the starting point for defining Arkansas
statewide 225 SF/FTE and exit leases and/or sell
network buildings Forward milestones, planning resource
C2.3 requirements, and determining measures of
Evaluate land use and sell or repurpose Pending
Improve land & underutilized State-owned lands
success
inventory
facility use assessment
C2.4 Represent specific, measurable, actionable,
Apply best practices across facility
Operations and management and operations (e.g., nalyzed via
A relevant, and time-bound projects
maintenance preventative maintenance contracting, procurement
centralization of vendor management)
Executing on these initiatives could enable Arkansas to
Total: ~$15-25M pursue, capture, and measure the value associated with
each lever
Source: Arkansas Division of Building Authority, Arkansas Cabinet Departments, US General Services Administration
Exhibit 8
68
Initiatives address key opportunities for additional value capture across the four real estate value levers as
well as major enablers that span levers as identified by site visits, conversations with real estate
personnel/leaders across Arkansas, and expert interviews.
Consolidating Little Rock office space
These 8 initiatives (including 5 quick wins) work to develop a Little Rock master plan, begin
consolidation across the metro area in accordance with the plan, and use existing spaces more efficiently
for an estimated potential impact of up to $10M-20M.
Optimizing the statewide network
These 6 initiatives (including 2 quick wins) evaluate the overall network for consolidation, begin
consolidation across the state, and begin reducing overall space needs for a full potential impact of $3M-
6M.
Improving land and facility use
These 2 initiatives evaluate and disposition underutilized land and establish a central land management
center of excellence across all major state landholders. Better data is required to determine the full
potential impact of the initiatives.
Operations and maintenance
These 3 initiatives work to implement maintenance best practices and reduce energy costs for owned
facilities. The potential impact of the initiatives is tracked in the procurement workstream.
Enablers
These 3 initiatives (including 1 quick win) clarify DBA capabilities and responsibilities in property
leasing and purchasing processes, build out the workplace management system, and reimagine the
structure, mandate, and size of the DBA organization to maximize value for the state.
10
October 9, 2024
Initiatives were identified, syndicated, and refined with leadership during Wave 1 of the Arkansas
Forward movement through a collection of cross-functional workshops.
eal estate initiatives for the near term an long term
uick in initiative
nitiative nitiative
evelop Little ock etro area real estate plan
valuate land use and sell or repurpose underutilized land
Consoli ate ittle
onsolidate office space in accordance ith Little ock etro area plan
an
(e.g., e it leases, sell buildings stablish central land anage ent center of e cellence across
o offi e spa e
C
ollocate all of to orth co ple griculture, , and other a or landholders
ove portion of fro uilding to apitol all (as
potential first phase of collocation entralize and opti ize aintenance for o ned properties (e.g.,
aintenan e
preventative aintenance, outsourcing
ove portion of fro Victor uilding to apitol all
(second phase of collocation
evaluate full service leases vs. insourced outsourced aintenance
ilot alternative orkspace design as part of ove to
C
across portfolio
o erce uilding
ake underutilized eeting spaces in Little ock available for
ncrease energ efficienc of o ned facilities
C
broader use
ple ent no net ne sites polic larif capabilities and responsibilities in propert leasing and
valuate space consolidation opportunities outside of Little ock purchasing processes
na lers
onsolidate office space outside of Little ock (e.g., e it leases, sell
a or
state i e net or
buildings valuate and upgrade orkplace anage ent s ste s to integrate
ptimi e
lease, space, and occupant data
ollocate V Veterans ervice Offices locations ith e isting
epart ent of the ilitar sites
ei agine the structure, andate, and size of the organization to
riage and relocate s all sites ith e piring leases outside of Little
a i ize value for the state and i prove occupant e perience
ock
reate hoteling and eeting roo availabilit list for distributed sites
C
across the state
stablish clear guidelines for paper file reduction to li it storage
space needs
ource rkansas ivision of uilding uthorit , rkansas or ard eal state kickoff orkshop, site visits, conversations i th real estate personnel leaders
across rkansas, e pert intervie s
. ddressed in eal state aster lan
Exhibit 9
B. Prioritized initiatives
The 22 initiatives are prioritized according to expected annual impact, feasibility to execute, and timeline
to implementation, identifying 13 for near-term implementation. This allows for initiatives to be staggered
in a sustainable, yet ambitious, way to balance effort and impact.
Real estate initiatives for the near term and long term
Captured in another
Analysis of prioritized initiatives by familiarity and value capture ## Initiative ID [-] One-time cost [+] One-time revenue *
workstream
Annual impact: Enabler 0 - $50K $50K - $500K $500K - $1.5M $1.5M - $5M $5M+
Familiarity
Familiar
660 673
“We can do this 672
right now” [-]
661 657 658
656
664 665 666
659 [-]
Unfamiliar
654 662 655
667
“We can do this [-]
674
[-] [-]
with support” [-] 663
670 [-]
669
* [-]
Uncertain 671
675 [-]
[-] 668
“We don’t know if
this can be done”
Near term Medium term Long term (Jun 2026+)
(2024) (Jan 2025-Jun 2026)
Time Horizon
Source: Arkansas Division of Building Authority, Arkansas Forward Real Estate kickoff workshop, site visits, conversations with real estate personnel/leaders across Arkansas, expert interviews
69
Exhibit 10
11
October 9, 2024
IMPLEMENTATION AND CHANGE MANAGEMENT PLAN
A. Pathways to future state
As the real estate organization evolves into its future state through the implementation of prioritized
initiatives, it will progress across 3 implementation phases. This phasing allows for incremental, not
overwhelming, improvement and growth in capabilities for staff and the organization. It also provides an
opportunity for the organization to apply learnings from previous phases to iterate on change
management, reprioritize initiatives, and improve implementation plans on later phases.
DRAFT AS OF APRIL 19, 2024
Horizons of real estate excellence
Continuously reprioritize long tail and
Capture quick wins Execute high-value long-term initiatives
emerging initiatives
Initia- Pilot alternative workspace design as part of Develop Little Rock metro area real estate plan Evaluate land use and sell / repurpose
tives ADWS move to Commerce Building Consolidate office space in accordance with Little underutilized land
Move ADE employees at DHS Building and Victory Rock metro area plan (e.g., exit leases, sell Establish central land management center of
Building to 2 Capitol Mall buildings) excellence across Agriculture, PHT, and other
Make underutilized meeting spaces in Little Rock Evaluate space consolidation opportunities outside major landholders
available for broader use of Little Rock Revaluate full-service leases vs. insourced/
Implement “no net new sites” polic Consolidate office space outside of Little Rock outsourced maintenance across portfolio
Collocate Veterans Service locations with DOTM Centralize and optimize maintenance for owned Create hoteling and meeting room availability list
for distributed sites across the state
Triage and relocate small sites with expiring leases properties (e.g., preventative maintenance,
outside Little Rock outsourcing) Clarify DBA capabilities and responsibilities in
Evaluate and upgrade workplace management property leasing and purchasing processes
Establish guidelines for paper file/storage
reduction systems to integrate lease, space, and occupant
data
Increase energy efficiency of owned facilities
Clarify DBA capabilities and responsibilities in
Reimagine the structure, mandate, and size of the
DBA organization to maximize value for the state
property leasing and purchasing processes
and improve occupant experience
Owner- Owner: Functional PMs Owner: Functional PM and designated initiative Owner: Functional PM and Arkansas Forward
ship & Management: Weekly functional PM check-ins owners PMO
Time- and eventually the Arkansas Forward project Management: Arkansas Forward project Management: Arkansas Forward project
line management organization (PMO) management organization (PMO) regular weekly management organization (PMO) ongoing
Timing: Value capture efforts begin now and monthly meetings reprioritization exercise
Timing: Value capture efforts begin after strategic Timing: Ongoing over length of Arkansas Forward
plans are revised within Wave 1 departmental implementation
initiative prioritization effort
Source: Arkansas Division of Building Authority, Arkansas Forward Real Estate kickoff workshop, site visits, conversations with real estate personnel/leaders 35
across Arkansas, expert interviews
Exhibit 11
Phase 1: In phase 1, DBA will implement quick wins to begin capturing near-term value. Topics include
beginning consolidation of office spaces, implementing cost reduction policies, and clarifying DBA
capabilities/responsibilities. This will take place over the next 6-12 months, with initiatives owned by
functional PMs.
Phase 2: In Phase 2, the state will execute high-value long-term initiatives. This includes initiatives such
as developing the real estate master plans, a more comprehensive consolidation, upgrading workplace
management systems, and reimagining the structure, mandate, and size of the DBA organization to
maximize value for the state.
Phase 3: In Phase 3, the central Real Estate team will continuously review and prioritize long tail and
emerging initiatives. The continuous improvement process will be overseen by the Arkansas Forward
PMO, and will evaluate ongoing efforts to improve land use, create a central land management center of
excellence, and re-evaluate maintenance for owned spaces.
B. Sequencing over horizons and rollout plan
To realize future state outcomes, Arkansas can organize its initiatives and implementation activities into
an initiative phasing plan. The plan organizes activities across the next 24+ months and categorizes
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October 9, 2024
activities by opportunity type, with callouts for key timeline considerations such as key owners, decisions,
milestones, and anticipated timeline to implementation.
As Arkansas progresses across implementation phases, it can assess its performance relative to its future
state goals, anticipate roadblocks, proactively schedule meetings for key decision points, and identify
opportunities for additional opportunity-enhancing projects.
Real Estate Opportunity Levers
PRELIMINARY
Launch Scale Improve
2024 2025 2026
Categories Opportunity Levers Efficiencies 7 8 9 1011121 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 1011121 2 3 4 5 6
C2 Consolidate Increase occupancy in Little Rock office space from ~330
$10M-20M
Little Rock SF/FTE to 200 SF/FTE and exit leases and/or sell buildings
office space
Consolidate non-Little Rock office space within and between
C2 Optimize $3M-6M
statewide towns to reach 225 SF/FTE and exit leases and/or sell buildings
network
C2 Sell or repurpose underutilized State-owned lands Pending
Improve land
inventory
& facility use
assessment
C2 Operations Apply best practices across facility management and operations
(e.g., preventative maintenance contracting, centralization of Analyzed in
&
vendor management) procurement
management
Implement new structure, processes, systems, technology, and
Operating
resources, to execute the new strategy, with centralized, n/a
Model
empowered RE function
Maintain change management and communications activities to
Change
Management
ensure successful adoption n/a
Total: ~$15M-25M 45
Exhibit 12
C. Change management plan
Realizing and sustaining the opportunity from Arkansas Forward activities requires a broader,
complimentary change management and communications effort to promote the adoption of new initiatives
and mitigate potential risks. These processes and practices will help manage impacted stakeholders, build
buy-in, and reduce friction during implementation.
Real estate leaders will manage several potential change management risks including challenges building
capabilities and capacity to administer the new approach, as well as, understanding and willingness by
departments to adopt the new approach. For example, employees may not understand the rationale for
moving to a new office and/or may resist, or lessors may resist changes to lease terms and conditions.
Across each opportunity category, the state can implement activities across four behavioral influences to
ensure the initiatives, and change program overall, are successful.
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October 9, 2024
Successful change programs address all four levers to influence
behaviors
1 2
Understanding & conviction Reinforcement with
Change story formal mechanisms
Ongoing, 2-way communications
1 2 Language and rituals
Structures and systems
Processes
“ hoose Incentives
to change my
mindset and
ehavior if …” 4 3
4 3 Role modeling Confidence &
Senior leader/senior team skill-building
role modeling Technical and relational skills
Symbolic acts Field-and-forum programs
Influencing of leaders Recruitment of new talent pool
Successful change programs are 8 times more likely to use all four areas of behavioral influences than just one
53
Exhibit 13
● Understanding and conviction: DBA will communicate the benefits of the statewide real estate
management approach, showing the value both to departments and citizens. Additionally, the
department will gather feedback from staff on existing pain points with respect to facilities and utilize
that information in developing and iterating on the future space management plans. This community
input helps foster a collaborative environment where all stakeholders feel ownership of the ultimate
plan.
● Formal reinforcement mechanisms: DBA will track several KPIs, such as utilization, energy saved,
maintenance spend, and economic impact on the community, and share the progress publicly with
staff and the community to celebrate achievement.
● Confidence & skill building: DBA will provide negotiation skills training for real estate function
employees to improve value capture of leases and vendor management. Additionally, it will
implement training in measurement of customer experience and improvement for real estate
employees given the intended focus on improvements in customer experience.
● Role modeling: The real estate function will identify leaders and encourage them to signal their
support for the new approach with their actions, including the updated remote work policies and time
in office.
D. Implications for Real Estate processes
While implementing related initiatives to improve real estate management, Arkansas will need to monitor
interdependencies between the real estate optimization, other domains within the Transformation and
Shared Services department (e.g., IT, Procurement, DFA), and other State of Arkansas departments and
proactively mitigate disruptions. Anticipated interdependencies include:
● Fleet need for real estate to store pooled vehicles and establish fueling depots
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October 9, 2024
● New IT systems for utilization tracking
● Remote/flexible work policies and the impact on real estate needs
Additionally, the increased scope and responsibilities of the more centralized and empowered DBA will
likely require growth in the number of FTEs assigned to the division to accommodate the increased
workload. A detailed assessment of staffing needs may be conducted as part of the implementation to
ensure appropriate resources for the new approach.
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For Arkansas Forward Steering Committee review
STRATEGIC PLAN FOR PAY AND PERFORMANCE
TO ACCELERATE ARKANSAS FORWARD
MAY 31, 2024
THE ARKANSAS FORWARD IMPERATIVE:
Governor Sanders launched Arkansas Forward with the aspiration for the State of Arkansas to set the
standard for government efficiency and effectiveness, through enterprise-wide operational change.
Achieving such an aspiration will not only involve delivering better state government services, at less cost,
for all Arkansans. To do so, state employees, teams, and departments will need to work together in new
ways and with new skills. Delivering Arkansas Forward’s potential, therefore, will require improving the
state government’s competitiveness and quality as an employer to attract, develop, and retain public
servants.
For these reasons, Governor Sanders has called for a redesign of Arkansas state government’s approach to
talent management focused upon skill development, performance, and continuous improvement. Recent
questions about the state government’s current approach to pay and performance evaluations highlight the
need for systemic change. A new approach centered upon the right people in the right roles with the right
skills and incentives can foster a performance culture among the state government workforce.
This paper:
• Summarizes challenges with the state government’s current approach and the imperative for
systematic change to deliver Arkansas Forward’s potential
• Introduces the main elements of a new system for public sector talent that prioritizes performance
and skill development to deliver continuous improvement
• Highlights the central importance of managers and their coaching and dialogues with their teams
to deliver the new approach, and, therefore, the need for focused and sustained training and
change management workforce-wide
CHALLENGES WITH CURRENT APPROACH:
Like other state governments, Arkansas confronts significant long-term talent challenges. Many of these
trends have been accelerated or exacerbated by recent labor market dynamics. These include challenges in
recruitment and retention, especially in critical roles ranging from frontline direct care staff to legal
professionals. Propelled by its workforce demographics, the state government has also begun to
experience the leading edge of a retirement wave, which risks loss of institutional knowledge and
experience. At the same time, the nature of work is changing and so too are expectations of the next
generation of the workforce. (See Appendix 1A for national trends data and Appendix 1B for data on
vacancy, turnover, and retirement eligibility rates across the Arkansas state government and by
department.) Public sector institutions will need to adapt to remain competitive in the future labor market.
Recently, interim modifications have been made to the state’s “myARPerformance” performance
evaluation approach, which was introduced in 2018. Formally, these modifications include moving from a
5-point to a 4-point system, removing the “forced curve” for scores, and some simplification of the
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For Arkansas Forward Steering Committee review
evaluation criteria. In theory, the system was designed to incentivize higher performance with high scorers
receiving increases to their annual base salaries.
In practice, however, the system has not been effective in either recognizing or promoting performance, as
suggested by interviews as well as data analysis. Most simply, many managers have approached the
annual performance review and ratings process primarily as a means to adjust base salaries for their teams
rather than to recognize superior performance. This is because managers have no other predictable way to
adjust base salaries. Furthermore, other limitations of the talent system have led to counterproductive
outcomes for enterprise performance. The lack of established expertise-based career paths has led some
highly skilled and experienced experts to transition to managerial roles mainly, and sometimes solely, for
increased pay. Likewise, departments have in some cases accepted an increased number of managers to
avoid losing valuable, experienced talent. Some departments have established new “upgraded” roles to be
more competitive for talent inside and outside the state government. The flexibility of the current “min-
max” compensation range for grades has in practice resulted in inconsistencies within and across
departments with potential implications for recruitment and retention. Lastly, the performance evaluation
system is perceived by many as unfair because it favors higher graded leaders over frontline staff (e.g.,
72% of GS15 were rated 4 or 5 in 2022, whereas only 15% of GS5 staff received 4 or 5 ratings).
The limitations in the current approach could have a significant impact on the achievement of Arkansas
Forward’s aspiration. The annual review process remains time-consuming and complex (e.g., evaluations
still involve 7 evaluation areas). The investment of tens of thousands of hours of collective manager effort
does not recognize or reward distinctive performance (e.g., 40%+ of state government employees received
the highest rating in the most recent reviews under the “interim” performance evaluation approach). The
use of annual reviews to advance goal setting, coaching, and skill development remain inconsistent. Their
quality depends upon individual managers’ personalities and priorities, not systematic training and
standards. Some managers may lack the skills or intrinsic motivation for their roles and instead would
prefer alternative career paths, if available. These dynamics likely impact retention as research suggests
the main drivers of US public sector employees considering leaving public service are poor managers,
lack of career development opportunities, and compensation. 1
In sum, the state government’s current approach to performance and pay does not deliver its intended
results. A systematic change is needed.
MAIN ELEMENTS OF A NEW SYSTEM FOR PERFORMANCE AND DEVELOPMENT
The successful implementation of Arkansas Forward, therefore, will require a new system to promote
performance and skill development across the state government workforce. Such a systemic approach
should be informed by proven private industry and government best practices tailored to Arkansas’s
unique history and context.
In adopting a new approach to employee performance and development, Arkansas will enhance its
competitiveness as an employer reinforced by the intrinsic meaningfulness of public service.
And, in doing so, Arkansas will help set a new national standard in state government talent management.
1 Georgios Athanaskopoulos, et al., “What Workers Want is Changing. That Could be Good for Government,”
McKinsey & Company (October 2022).
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For Arkansas Forward Steering Committee review
Exhibit 1 summarizes the major shifts in the state government’s approach to talent to support the
implementation of Arkansas Forward.
Exhibit 1
The new system to deliver these shifts has three main elements:
• Performance-driven compensation linked to market dynamics, reinforced by bonuses
• Streamlined roles, paths, and skill development
• Simplified and more effective semi-annual performance evaluation approach
A. Performance-driven compensation linked to market dynamics, reinforced by performance bonuses
Central to the new approach is the linkage of compensation to individual performance and market
dynamics. Such an approach will both incentivize individual performance and enhance the state
government’s overall competitiveness as an employer.
As an important control, however, increases in compensation to reward performance would be contingent
upon sufficient room in the state budget. For instance, some adjustments may be prioritized over others,
resources devoted to annual performance bonuses (i.e., “bonus pools”) reduced, or other measures taken to
manage within a budget context.
Three components will define the new approach across the state government enterprise:
1) Integrating market dynamics into base pay schedules: Base pay schedules should be regularly
reviewed against prevailing labor market dynamics in Arkansas and its region and adjusted as
needed. The state will commit to the principle of achieving at least “market minimum”
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For Arkansas Forward Steering Committee review
competitiveness for all roles in state government (e.g., salary meeting at least the 10% decile).
Importantly, the state could also identify specific priority occupations or roles as strategically
important for recruitment and retention and, therefore, adopt higher standards for market
competitiveness in base salaries (e.g., salary meeting at least the 50% decile or higher). Such an
approach would also involve regular independent compensation surveys across all job families
and roles (e.g., every 2 years in synch with budget cycle), supplemented as needed by analyses of
targeted job families. Based upon such analyses – and contingent upon other budget priorities –
pay tables would then be updated to reflect market dynamics and priorities.
Note: Departments may also decide to adopt temporary non-performance measures to attract
and/or retain for specific priority roles within their authorized budgets (e.g., one-time recruiting
bonuses paid after one year of service).
2) Recognizing employees who meet or exceed performance expectations for role: Employees who in
the last year have met or exceeded performance expectations for their roles will be eligible to
receive a standard “step” increase in annual salary. Employees not meeting their basic
performance expectations will not be eligible for an annual step increase. Such a “step” will be
modest but meaningful to balance incentives for consistent performance within prudent budgetary
limits (e.g., ~1.5%). Again, the award of step increases to eligible employees would be contingent
upon the state government’s budget for that year. Significantly, recognition of satisfactory
performance in this way will enable managers to focus more critically upon recognizing truly
distinctive performance with other incentives, including bonuses (immediately below).
3) Providing bonuses for distinctive performance: Distinctive performance will be recognized in two
formal ways:
a. One-time annual bonuses: An individual can be recognized for consistent distinctive
performance throughout the year with a one-time annual bonus. Such distinctive
performance is typically concentrated among an organization’s top performers (e.g., 20-
25%). Consequently, such an approach will provide differential rewards at the highest
levels of performance. For instance, the approach could focus upon the top 25%
performance (e.g., top 10% receive 10% bonus; next 15% receive 5% – see Appendix 2
for budget scenario for this approach) or solely the top 10%, or other potential
combinations. Such bonuses could also be capped to favor more frontline and mid-level
staff versus senior executives (e.g., $5000 cap on annual bonus per year). Significantly,
such an approach has the advantage of limiting the long-term budget impact of the
performance system by not affecting base salaries versus the current system that relies
exclusively upon permanent base salary increases.
b. “Spot” bonuses: An individual or team can be awarded “spot” bonuses for exceptional
service on specific projects or initiatives. Spot bonuses can be provided to individuals or
teams. Such spot bonuses can include cash (up to $5000), extra leave, and/or the ability to
“cash out” a limited amount of annual leave. As currently designed, spot bonuses will be
supported within the current budgets of departments, at the discretion of department
leaders. When spot bonuses would be awarded to a team, the team members would be
eligible to receive their share if their most recent performance evaluation showed them as
at least meeting performance expectations in the previous year’s review. Likewise, an
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For Arkansas Forward Steering Committee review
employee evaluated as not meeting expectations would not be eligible in the following
year for individual spot bonuses.
The adoption of such an approach to performance-based salary increases and bonuses requires
“guardrails” for fairness. First, as standard practice, annual expectations for employees should include
linkage to team, department, or even enterprise-wide objectives. These should incorporate quantitative
KPIs, wherever possible, or specific qualitative descriptions of performance to enable consistent
assessment. Second, a department or division leader should review and approve the eligibility of any
employee recommended for a one-time annual performance bonus and/or a “spot” bonus. Such a review
will help ensure consistent application of performance standards and managerial accountability.
Operationally, this new approach will involve the transition in pay tables from the current “min-max”
approach (i.e., pay tables structured by grades with pay ranges defined by a minimum and a maximum) to
a more structured “step” approach (i.e., pay tables structured by grades with pay ranges defined in set
increments or “steps”). Variations upon a step approach are commonly employed by other governments.
They provide more structure, consistency, and transparency in compensation for managers and employees
(current and prospective). Such an approach also helps provide greater consistency across departments in
compensation for comparable roles, experience, and performance. A number of Arkansas departments
already favor a move to a “step” approach.
This approach is also adaptable to support the integration of market dynamics into base pay schedules
across different major occupation groups. Arkansas has already adopted separate pay tables for executives,
medical professions, and information technology professions, in addition to its standard general pay table,
to improve market competitiveness. The initial implementation of a new step approach could include:
• General
• Information technology
• Medical
• Corrections (new)
• Law enforcement and public safety (new)
• Professional services (e.g., legal, accounting, engineering, etc.) (new)
Additional pay tables for specialized occupations could be considered in future evolutions of the approach
based upon analyses of market dynamics and government priorities.
Given distinctive market dynamics in recruiting top executive-level talent, Arkansas could preserve the
enhanced flexibility with a distinct “min-max” pay scale approach for Cabinet leaders and a small cadre of
the state’s senior most executives (e.g., ~200-300 executives). This category may also include limited
number of highly specialized technical expertise that may not appropriately fit within established pay
tables.
Exhibit 2 provides three examples to illustrate how a new approach to performance-driven compensation
linked to market dynamics, reinforced by performance bonuses could work in practice.
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For Arkansas Forward Steering Committee review
Exhibit 2
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For Arkansas Forward Steering Committee review
Three important caveats should be considered in implementing this new approach.
1) Preserving Governor’s discretion: As noted above, all adjustments to annual pay plans would
remain at the discretion of the Governor within the legislatively approved budget. While the new
approach would adopt the principle of integrating market dynamics into compensation, the
Governor would remain empowered to adapt to changing fiscal demands as needed.
2) Building in budget sustainability: Previously, Arkansas state government employed a “step” pay
plan approach, but its costs proved unsustainable because its steps were too large (e.g., ~5%+ per
step in annual salary increase). To ensure budget sustainability, the new approach should define
more modest increases for employees meeting or exceeding performance expectations (e.g.,
~1.5%). Other states have up to 30 steps per pay grade. For instance, Arkansas could adopt 28
steps per pay grade, reflecting the state retirement eligibility of 28 years.
3) Reinforcing performance evaluation consistency: The functioning of any performance-based
system ultimately hinges upon the consistent application of real performance standards within and
across departments. Otherwise, any performance system can be “gamed” or degraded. And the
foundation for such consistency in upholding standards rests upon managers’ skill and will in
evaluating performance. This applies to both ends of the performance spectrum. This is further
outlined in (C) below.
The implementation plan for this element is provided in Appendix 4. Budget scenarios for different
elements of the pay strategy are provided in Appendix 2.
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For Arkansas Forward Steering Committee review
B. Streamlined roles, paths, and skill development
A revamped approach to performance and pay will be strengthened by essential improvements in the
fundamentals of role and career path definition.
Four components will define the new approach:
1) Defining expertise-based career paths: Establishing new career pathways for technical or expert
non-manager roles will help encourage advancement and development of experts without
incentivizing them move to managerial roles solely for increased pay. Such career paths would
define progression not just within a single role, but through a series of roles of increasing
responsibility and impact. This will involve the introduction of new roles for distinctive subject
matter experts outside of the current managerial tracks for career and compensation progression
(e.g., “master” engineer or legal roles). OPM has already begun the process of developing such
career ladders.
2) Streamlining and standardizing roles: The Office of Personnel Management periodically
performs reviews to simplify the roles within job families across the state government.
Streamlining the current role classification structure (1,700+ classifications) into fewer, more
consistent roles and descriptions across departments will help aligns with a skills-first approach,
clarify career paths, simplify recruitment/retention, and enables more rapid pay analyses in future.
Furthermore, a more consistent approach may help reduce cross-department turnover.
3) Moving to job family approach for departments: Providing departments the ability to hire
individuals within a job family rather than a specific set of job roles will offer departments greater
flexibility in hiring, within their authorized budgets. Such an approach will also reduce the
administrative burden between departments and the Office of Personnel Management related to
technical role adjustments.
4) Integrating skills-based practices in role qualifications: Across the private and public sectors,
momentum has increased to move away from degree-based qualifications to more skilled-based
approaches to talent management. The integrating of skills-based practices into role descriptions –
and in recruitment, development, and promotion, more broadly – will help the state expand the
pool of available talent to address vacancies while also providing new career paths and
incentivizes for current employees to continuously develop their skills and capabilities.
The implementation plan for this element is provided in Appendix 4. Budget scenarios are provided in
Appendix 2.
C. Simplified and more effective semi-annual performance evaluations
Like Arkansas, many organizations across sectors have concluded in the past two decades that the
“traditional” annual performance review process is neither efficient nor effective. As evidenced by
Arkansas’s experience, such processes not only tend to be time consuming and often complex (e.g.,
multiple competencies, numerous questions that can be repetitive or not appropriate for a role) but also of
limited value in providing helpful development feedback (i.e., delayed, not continuous) or performance
assessments.
Arkansas Forward is therefore outlining an alternative approach that instead emphasizes design principles
including simplicity, focus on essentials, more frequent assessment, and data-informed consistency.
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For Arkansas Forward Steering Committee review
In Arkansas such an approach will involve moving to a dramatically simplified evaluation process. Such
an approach would have managers assess an employee only upon the most important dimensions related to
his or her role and the overall priorities from Arkansas Forward. Such an assessment would significantly
reduce the time devoted to completing the formal evaluation process – down to minutes – thus leaving
more time for reflection and feedback conversations. Such simplified assessments could be completed
across platforms – mobile, laptop, tablet, or desktop computer – to improve ease of execution.
Additionally, departments could elect to have not only managers provide input upon their direct reports,
but also upon other employees with whom they have had significant exposure during the review cycle
(e.g., worked together on a cross-department or cross-division team; staff with “matrixed” roles aligned
with enterprise shared services and supporting specific departments). Such an approach would not only
provide more and varied feedback to employees, but also help with calibration of assessments.
Conducting an assessment twice a year not only will increase the opportunities for evaluative feedback but
also provide important data to improve the quality of the overall process. First and foremost, the new
approach would introduce disciplined “calibration” of ratings within and across departments to ensure
consistency and fairness. In the current Arkansas system, there is no opportunity for meaningful
calibration because the distribution of ratings is analyzed too late to make a difference. By contrast, the
mid-year evaluation will provide data to enable “calibration” discussions within and across departments in
time to make adjustments. For instance, managers with patterns of consistently high ratings across their
teams can then be identified for additional calibration and coaching. Likewise, to incentivize managers,
their own evaluation expectations would include a core responsibility the effective coaching and
evaluation of their team members. Lastly, more frequent evaluations provide additional data throughout a
year to better assess, in a more granular way, individual performance. Employees will not receive a single
whole number rating (e.g., 4 or 5) as they do today, when an entire group is approved for a merit salary
increase. Instead, the new approach will involve a more nuanced score reflecting the average of scores
across multiple dimensions – and potentially multiple assessors – to provide scores measured in decimal
places (e.g., 3.7, 4.3). This is an important technical nuance. When supported by robust “calibration”
dialogues and expectations, this approach helps increase the variation among performance evaluations to
highlight consistently distinctive performance. And this will enable more fine-tuned performance
recognition (e.g., for top 10% of performance versus simply “anyone receiving a 4”).
Exhibit 3 provides a state government example of such a simplified evaluation approach.
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Exhibit 3
Additional details on the potential design and delivery of such a performance evaluation approach from
private sector and state government examples are provided in Appendix 5 and Appendix 6.
PUTTING THE MANAGER AT THE CENTER OF PERFORMANCE AND DEVELOPMENT:
Experience and recent research across industries highlights the critical importance of managers to shaping
organizational culture and delivering impact. 2
How managers work with their team members to define goals, coach, build skills, hold accountable, and
assess and recognize performance is foundational to any performance management system. Effective
managers do not rely solely upon formal annual review processes to inform their performance and
coaching dialogues with team members. Instead, they engage in an ongoing basis throughout the year in a
series of different, but related coaching conversations to promote both skill development and clear
performance standards and assessments.
While the specific format varies with different work environments (e.g., a call center versus budget
analysis), four types of conversations between managers and their team members promote a performance
culture (as summarized in Exhibit 4).
2 Jim Clifton and Jim Harter, It’s the Manager: Moving from Boss to Coach (2019); Bill Schaninger, Bryan
Hancock, and Emily Field, Power to the Middle: Why Managers Hold the Keys to the Future of Work
(2023).
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For Arkansas Forward Steering Committee review
Exhibit 4
Appreciating the central role of managers provides a guiding “north star” for the design of any new
approach to performance, skill development, and continuous improvement. A performance system’s
design should help managers have the right kind of conversations with their team members to incentivize
their development and performance. At the same time, the managers themselves require both the skills and
clear accountability to promote the fair implementation of the system.
Consequently, the effectiveness of the new approach will depend not just upon the formal policies, tools,
and pay tables, but, more fundamentally, a shift in managers’ expectations and behaviors across the
enterprise.
Such a shift will involve a systematic and sustained change management effort. Well-designed and
orchestrated enterprise-wide change management can dramatically increase the probability of success.
Such efforts integrate building understanding and conviction across all levels of the workforce, integrating
new approaches into the state government’s formal systems and processes, building skills and confidence
in ability to deliver the change, and, lastly, role modeling by leaders and informal influencers. Such an
approach is not a “one and done” training, but sustained through years to establish a “new normal” in how
state government managers manage, every day.
The change management plan is provided in Appendix 7.
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Appendices: Strategic plan for pay and
performance to accelerate Arkansas Forward
May 2024
Purpose
The purpose of this document is to provide supporting appendices for the Revised Performance Evaluation
Plan and Revised Pay Structure Plan as an output of the Arkansas Forward initiative. These strategic plans
are intended to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of Arkansas state government. The contents of this
document are based on data and inputs available as May 31, 2024.
2
Appendix 1: Talent trends
Appendix 1A: National public sector and general talent trends
Appendix 1B: Arkansas state government talent trends
Appendix 2: Preliminary budget implication scenarios
Appendix 3: Illustrative pay plan examples and other case examples
Table of
contents Appendix 4: Potential implementation plans
Appendix 5: Performance evaluation case study
Appendix 6: Performance evaluation system design parameters –
private sector examples
Appendix 7: Change management plan
3
Appendix 1A: National public sector and
general talent trends
4
Pre-COVID, state governments already faced significant challenges
attracting and hiring talent
Job Postings Applicants
Talent Gap 2020
Local and state workforce: % change in job postings vs. job applicants (2013 through April 2020)
80%
Postings dropped 22.2%
55%
59% since just before the
60%
46% pandemic, while the
40%
39% number of applicants fell
29% even more (33.1%)
22% 19%
20% 13% 16% 16%
6% 8% State employees are an
0
0% 84% average of four years older
0% 4%
than workers in other
-20% industries, with a
significant portion eligible
-40% to retire in the next decade
-38%
-60%
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020
Source: Transform State Government's Workforce for Tomorrow ( NASCA) 5
The traditional value proposition for
government employment is eroding
Based on national survey of State Chief Administrators and HR Directors
When asked to rank the greatest barriers to attracting high quality
talent, CAOs responded Tough competition – 85% of states
cited an inability to offer salaries
We are unable to offer competitive competitive with the private sector
85%
salaries when to the private sector
There is a negative perception in the Changing expectations – Lifetime
55% employment now has less appeal,
public about working for government
especially among the millennial
Workers do not consider working in generation
46%
public service as a viable career option
Lack of public support – 55% of
We lack recruitment tools to make
33% surveyed State Chief Administrators
the process more efficient
pointed to a negative perception in the
Misalignment between job descriptions and public about working for government as
27%
required skills a top barrier to attracting talent
State government is located in a Low unemployment and growth in the
27%
less attractive city or is far from urban centers private sector – Since the 2008-09
recession, the private sector has grown
Other 18% almost 13% thereby shrinking the total
available labor pool
Mandatory time requirements for job advertising 9%
Source: Job One: Reimagine Today's State Government Workforce ( NASCA) 6
The number of employees accelerating retirement increased since the
start of the pandemic
Postponed their retirement Accelerate their retirement date
Changes in decisions made by retirement-eligible employees (2009-2023)
60
55 53%
50
44%
45
40
35%
35
30
25 22%
20 17%
15 12%
10
5
0
2008 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 2023
Note: Responses sum to more than 100% because some jurisdictions reported more than one type of action taken. This survey was not conducted in 2010.
Source: MissionSquare Research Institute 7
Public sector time-to-hire is ~3x as long as the private sector, leading to
greater likelihood of losing high-quality talent
Time-to-hire by type of organization (days), 20201
The state and local sector average
Local 130 time-to-hire is 113 days – more
than 3x the average of the private
sector at 36 days (a difference of
over two months)2
Education 119
60 percent of job seekers stopped
partway through while filling out an
State 96 online application3
Reducing the length of the
application process to five minutes
Private 36 or less can lead to a 365%
increase in conversion rates3
1. NEOGOV - Time-to-Hire report
2. It is important to note that the private sector measures time-to-hire differently than the public sector and does not utilize the same recruitment stages as the
public sector. The private sector’s recruitment process is comprised of fewer steps.
3. National Association of State Chief Administrators (NASCA)
Source: “Time to Hire Report 2020”, NEOGOV 8
Proprietary
Compensation matters to public servants… but so do other factors
We asked public sector employees “Are you …then, if not, “What’s making you leave?”
planning to stay?”… Definitions for top
Reasons public sector employees plan to Reasons public sector employees plan to categories:
stay in current role leave current role
% of respondents intending to stay in the next 3-6 % of respondents intending to leave in the next 3-6 Compensation includes total
months (n=1,118) months (n=385)1
benefits to employees
Compensation 61% Career development 45% Meaningful work connects
Meaningful work 41% Leadership 42% employees’ values and
organization’s mission
Workplace flexibility 35% Compensation 38%
Workplace flexibility
Geography 31% Workplace inflexibility 30% includes both time and format
Expectations 28% Meaningless work 25% Career development
Colleagues 23% Colleagues 24% includes opportunities to
develop skills and accelerate
Workplace safety 19% Expectations 23%
career
Career development 18% Wellbeing 18%
Leadership refers to quality
Wellbeing 17% Community 16% of direct manager-employee
Community 11% Workplace safety 14% relationship
Leadership 9% Resources 13%
Resources 6% Geography 12%
1. This is the ratio of respondents intending to leave (385) by the respondents intending to stay (1118) in the next 3-6 months
Note: People leaving includes individuals who quit, retired, and other separations
Source: McKinsey & Company, 2022 Great Attrition, Great Attraction 2.0 global survey - Public Sector (N = 1503) 9
Across worker generations, compensation is one factor among others
for attracting and retaining employees
Difference between Gen Z and younger Baby Boomers
Top 3 reasons for leaving a previous
job Top 3 reasons for accepting a new job Top 3 reasons for staying in current job
Younger Baby Younger Baby Younger Baby
Gen Z (18-24) Boomers (55-64) Gen Z (18-24) Boomers (55-64) Gen Z (18-24) Boomers (55-64)
1st Lack of career Lack of career Career
development and development and development and Adequate total Workplace Adequate total
advancement advancement advancement compensation flexibility compensation
potential potential potential
2nd Career
Lack of meaningful Inadequate total Adequate total development and
Meaningful work Meaningful work
work compensation compensation advancement
potential
3rd
Inadequate total Uncaring and Workplace Workplace
Meaningful work Meaningful work
compensation uninspiring leaders flexibility flexibility
1. Out of 12 answer choices that were offered in the original question. Analysis includes only respondents reporting a traditional employer-employee relationship, in which an employer hires the employee, pays them
directly, and manages their work. Responses are not exclusive to public sector employees; 2. Gen Z, n =1,170; younger baby boomers, n = 1,403 3. Gen Z, n = 2,058; younger baby boomers, n = 3,376 4. Gen Z, n =
1,280; younger baby boomers, n = 3,190
10
Source: McKinsey & Company: “Gen what? Debunking age -based myths about worker preferences”, 2023
Appendix 1B: Arkansas state government
talent trends
11
Arkansas state government challenges:
FY23 vacancy rate across Arkansas cabinet departments
# of authorized
#
positions
Vacancy rate1, by department, FY23
307 68 6320 1775 1176 8234 460 293 2806 558 2407 475 667 970 1528 28044
51
43
31
22 20 20 21
19 19 18 18 16 16 16 15
10
VA IG Cor Com ADE DHS TSS L&L DFA Mil. ADH DQE ADA PHT PS TOTAL
1. Vacancy rate defined as number of vacant positions divided by total number of authorized positions. Vacant positions defined as vacancies less than two years old or older than two years, justified by
departments, and not on the 796-hold list
12
Source: OPM FY 2023 personnel data for AR Executive Branch Departments
Arkansas state government challenges:
FY23 turnover rate across Arkansas cabinet departments
# of authorized
#
positions
Turnover rate1, by department, FY23
307 6320 8234 68 667 2806 1176 1775 558 1528 970 475 293 2407 460 28044
33
24
22
18 17 18
15 14 14 13 13 13 12 12 12 10
VA Cor DHS IG ADA DFA ADE Com Mil. PS PHT DQE L&L ADH TSS TOTAL
1. Turnover rate defined as the number of employees who left state government divided by the average number of employees over a 12-month period
13
Source: OPM FY 2023 personnel data for AR Executive Branch Departments
Arkansas state government challenges:
Select critical positions identified by Arkansas cabinet departments
% of state Vacancy Avg.
Illustrative job family1 Total positions workforce rate, % turnover2, %
Correctional Officers and Jailers 2,614 9% 46 17
Nursing Assistants 1,436 5% 34 15
Supervisors of Correctional Officers 1,391 5% 19 8
Customer Service Representatives 1,043 4% 23 23
Project Management Specialist 1,043 4% 20 14
Supervisors of Administrative Support Workers 1,009 4% 25 12
Eligibility Interviewers, Government Programs 822 3% 8 5
Administrative Support Workers 795 3% 22 9
Registered Nurse 585 2% 22 9
Lawyers 212 1% 16 9
1. Ten of the target job families with the highest position counts across all departments submitted by departments in December of 2023
2. FY19 - FY23
14
Source: OPM FY 2023 personnel data for AR Executive Branch Departments
Arkansas state government challenges:
Overall, Arkansas pay raises have not matched across-the-board inflation
Aggregate inflation adjustments1 implemented in peer states and against regional
inflation, FY19-FY23, %
19%
16%
• Arkansas legislature
removed COLAs from the
13% annual personnel
12% budgeting process in
FY17
• From FY17 to FY23,
7% Arkansas State
5% Employees did not receive
across-the-board pay
3%
2% increases
0% • Over same period,
regional CPI rose 19%
Missouri Alabama Georgia Oklahoma Texas Arkansas Mississippi Louisiana Arkansas
regional CPI
inflation
1. Inflation adjustments tracked using public announcements from Governors Offices and Legislators with explicit eligibility to all State Government Employees
Source: State Budgets, Public notices from government websites, Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI 15
Arkansas state government challenges:
Arkansas state wages compared to inflation over past 5 fiscal years
Arkansas regional inflation compared to state wage increases by fiscal year, Arkansas regional price inflation
accumulated percentage point rate increases, %1 State of Arkansas employees - 2 ratings
State of Arkansas employees - 3 ratings
24 State of Arkansas employees - 4 ratings
State of Arkansas employees - 5 ratings
22
20
18 • Since FY19, Arkansas
16 regional price inflation has
increased ~19%
14
• Consistent top performing
12 employees earned ~3pp
10 over inflation over this 5-year
period
8
• Consistent “in good
6 standing” employees saw
4 real wages decrease over
the past two years
2
0
FY19 FY20 FY21 FY22 FY23
1. Percentages represent accumulated inflation over time, based on simple compounding of annual inflation measures, compared to compounded average rate
increases for Arkansas State employees, broken out by end of year rating. Estimate assumes consistent performance rating across years
Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI; Bureau of Labor Statistics Annual Census of Employment and Wages, AR OPM Employee Ratings Longitudinal Data 16
Arkansas state government challenges:
Performance evaluation ratings are unevenly distributed across grades
Percent of employees across GS grades receiving each PE rating, 2022, % of GS cohort1
GS grade # of positions
GS15 73 0% 1% 27% 40% 32%
GS14 137 0% 2% 31% 34% 34%
GS13 314 0% 4% 47% 33% 16%
GS12 0% 2% 51% 29% 19%
“Survey research
340
GS11 549 0% 3% 50% 31% 16% showed that 60 percent
GS10 441 0% 2% 40% 38% 20% of respondents who
GS09 1228 0% 4% 53% 30% 12% perceived the
GS08 1503 0% 6% 55% 27% 12%
GS07 2458 0% 5% 62% 27% 7% performance-
GS06 4581 0% 10% 69% 17% 4% management system as
GS05 3167 0% 17% 68% 13% 2% fair also stated that it
GS04 1923 0% 10% 70% 17% 3% was effective”2
GS03 2867 0% 18% 75% 5% 2%
GS02 308 0% 15% 74% 8% 2%
GS01 228 0% 9% 88% 2% 1%
1 2 3 4 5
Performance evaluation ratings
1. % calculated by dividing number of employees receiving specific rating by all employees in same GS grade
2. “The Fairness Factor in Performance Management,” McKinsey & Company, April 2018
Source: Arkansas state employee ratings data, OPM, 2022; Interviews conducted with 15 department HR administrators 17
Arkansas state government challenges:
Limited career paths likely contributes to more middle manager roles
Distribution of FTEs across layers
Current avg span
Total FTE Non-manager Manager Ideal span1
Layer positions positions Non-Managers Managers positions Average Span per manager
1 0
15 15 10.11
2 5.3
7.6
3 152 44 108 5.8
7.1
4 824 465 359 6.4
5.8
5 2550 1824 726
7.4
1016 5.7
6 4219 3203
8.0
5758 868 5.6
7 4890
8.4
4878 4161 6.7
8 717 8.6
4807 4377 430 9.7
9
8.7
4170 4102 9.5
10 68
8.6
11 649 648 1 1.0
6.0
12 1 1
6.0
Total 28,022 23,713 4,307 7.95
1. Algorithm used takes into consideration the ideal span in managerial archetype range closest to current span
Source: OPM FY 2023 personnel data for AR Executive Branch Departments; validated by department HR managers 18
Arkansas state government challenges:
Sentiments behind the data – interview and workshop highlights
“A program assistant at a
"We need to train managers “Our current performance
“Getting anyone in is difficult GS03 is making $26K a
better – clearer and greater review process is not
and if there’s no room for year and they’re
expectations for managers, working. It does not reflect
advancement, they leave transporting children who
especially for performance real evaluation of
after a couple years.” are being taken away from
evaluations." employees’ work.”
their parents.”
“There’s no way anyone can
“Currently, managers don’t “PE system should not “We have good employees read and review all of this
actually meet with their crush employee morale and happy employees who [evaluation material]. You’re
employees.” every year.” can’t afford to work for us.” just going to read and do
the best you can.”
Source: Interviews with departmental talent leads
19
Arkansas state government challenges: ~13% of the most experienced
Arkansas state employees are retirement eligible in next 5 years
Employees eligible for % of employees eligible for
Cabinet retirement1 Total employees retirement1
Department of Agriculture 72 551 13%
Department of Commerce 177 1,127 16%
Department of Corrections 415 4,346 10%
Department of Education 116 879 13%
Department of Energy and Environment 59 392 15%
Department of Finance and Administration 335 2,291 15%
Department of Health 326 1,962 17%
Department of Human Services 763 6,540 12%
Department of Labor and Licensing 57 234 24%
Department of Parks, Heritage, and Tourism 85 807 11%
Department of Public Safety 205 1,367 15%
Department of the Inspector General 4 39 10%
Department of the Military 40 408 10%
Department of Transformation & Shared Services 66 323 20%
Department of Veteran Affairs 2 146 1%
Non-Cabinet 140 1,093 13%
Total 2,862 22,505 13%
1. Does not use personally identifiable information (PII) such as age. Estimated based on employee tenure within state government, not accounting for other employment outside of this area. Retirement eligibility placed
at 28 years of tenure, therefore employees with >23 years of tenure are eligible within the next 5 years 20
Source: Arkansas Office of Personnel Management – employee tenure within state government
Arkansas state government context: Current pay and position policies
and statutes on setting pay
Policy # Policy summary # Deep dives
Pay and position activity
The Legislature is responsible for authorizing rates of pay (pay tables) for grades. OPM is
3 1 Modifying job grade & pay tables
responsible for reviewing the pay tables before each regular session. Proposed1: 10%
increase for max. Proposed1: Collapse GS01-05 into GS05.
Departments may submit proposed grids to OPM and must receive approval from TSS
32 2 Establishing salary administration grids Sec. up to the midpoint salary increase. Dept. must receive approval from TSS Sec. and
Leg. Council or JBC above the midpoint level.
29 Merit payments are paid as a base salary increase for the employee. Merit qualifications
3 Merit pay increase depend/change year to year. Merit pay increases can exceed max payment
Setting pay
35 Special rates of pay - Labor market rate A department may request a labor market rate if they are unable to successfully hire and/or
4 retain employees in a specific classification or position. Departments report approved LMRs
up to midpoint and max
to OPM and OPM reports them to the Legislature
35 Special rates of pay - Retention and Departments can issue a 10% or above salary increase to employees in order to retain
5 additional duties 10% and above them. OPM must approve increases above 10% and report all increases to the Legislature
increase for review.
35 A department may request an increased salary for a candidate deemed extraordinarily
6 Special rates of pay - Extraordinarily qualified. Up to 15% requires Secretary approval. Between 15 – 40% requires OPM
qualified candidate 15%, 15-40%, and
40%+ above entry level rate approval. Above 40% requires review by Legislature followed by OPM approval.
1. Proposed by OPM, as of May 2024
Source: Uniform Personnel Classification and Compensation Plan Committee Reference Guide; OPM policies; OPM interviews 21
Arkansas state government context: Current pay and position policies
and statutes on managing positions
Policy # Pay and position activity Policy summary # Deep dives
7 Creating a new position Departments may submit requests for new positions during the biennial budget
1
process. OPM is responsible for reviewing and submitting requests. Legislature
is responsible for authorizing new positions.
8 Revising positions or grades Reclassification of positions occurs every two years as a part of the budget
1 request process. Requests for new titles for positions must be approved by the
legislature.
Managing positions
9 Promoting employees Employees promoted within the same pay table receives a 10% increase
25
without exceeding the max pay for the grade.
10 Managing pool positions Positions used to meet needs in between sessions and a dept. does not have
44 an existing vacant position available with the correct grade and classification.
Dept. must surrender an existing position in exchange. OPM manages the
pool and seeks approval from Council on behalf of depts.
Act 796 Positions vacant for more than 2 years must be reported by OPM to the
11 Vacant positions
Legislature for review. Departments can either request the positions be
terminated and not renewed. Governor’s office reviews justifications.
N/A 12 Career ladders No official policy governing the career pathways. OPM encourages
departments to develop their own career paths based on qualifications.
Source: Uniform Personnel Classification and Compensation Plan Committee Reference Guide; OPM policies; OPM interviews 22
Appendix 2: Preliminary budget
implication scenarios
23
Preliminary budget implication scenarios:
Linkage to market dynamics
Preliminary 1 year cost scenarios
Calculations used to create
Methodology budget scenario Total revenue General revenue
2017 was the last time the state adjusted 3.2% x total current salaries for $36.54M $14.62M
Scenario A: Avg. salaries for inflation executive branch departments
% inflation increase
since 2017 Average inflation rate over the past 7 (2017-
2023) years in the Arkansas region was 3.2%
2019 used as a midpoint for historical inflation 3.8% x total current salaries for $43.40M $17.36M
Scenario B: Avg. data executive branch departments
% inflation increase
since 2019 Average inflation rate over the past 5 (2019-
2023) years in the Arkansas region was 3.8%
2021-2023 captures the most recent, acute 5.9% x total current salaries for $67.37M $26.95M
Scenario C: Avg. increases in inflation, post-COVID executive branch departments
% increase since
2021 Average inflation rate over the past 3 (2021-
2023) years in the Arkansas region was 5.9%
Conservative flat 2% increase 2% x total current salaries for $22.8M $9.14M
Scenario D: Flat executive branch departments
2% increase
Source: OPM personnel data for executive branch departments excluding constitutional, extra help, boards, pulled March 2024; BLS CPI data 2017-2023 All items in West South-Central 24
region (Arkansas), all urban consumers, not seasonally adjusted, pulled 4/22/2024
Preliminary budget implication scenarios:
Performance-based awards module
Potential option highlighted in draft plan Preliminary 1 yr cost scenarios
Methodology Calculations used to create budget scenario Total revenue General revenue
Estimated projected average 2024 salary cost for 4s and 5s, based
Reward highest performing employees
on past 5 years of historic data
$14.47M $5.79M
Scenario A: Merit
Continue status quo method of increasing base
raise; target top Calculated number of 4s and 5s in the top 10% of employees based
salary
10%; 10% salary on ratings
increase Multiplied the number of employees x 10% of the average salaries for
their ratings band
Estimated projected average 2024 salary cost for 3s, 4s, and 5s,
Reward top performers all the same
based on past five years of historical data
$49.67M $19.87M
Scenario B: One-
Award a one-time bonus instead of a base salary
time bonus; Target increase to incentivize similar performance the
Calculated number of 3s, 4s, and 5s, in top 40% of employees based
top 40%; 10% of on ratings
next year
salary Multiplied the number of employees times 10% of the average salary
for their ratings band
Scenario C: One- Reward top performers at differing rates, valuing Used distribution and salary cost from scenario 2
$39.30M $15.72M
the highest performers the most
time bonus; 5% Multiplied the total salary cost of top 10% by 15%
bonus for 60th to Award a one-time bonus instead of a base
Multiplied the total salary cost of next 30% by 5%
90th percentile; salary increase to incentivize similar
performance the next year Summed the two costs
15% 90th & above
Scenario D: One- Reward top performers at differing rates, valuing Used distribution and salary cost from scenario 2 $19.85M $7.94M
time bonus; 10% the highest performers the most while limiting
Multiplied the total salary cost of top 10% by 10% with max of $5,000
bonus for top 10%; budget impacts from bonuses from highest-paid
employees Multiplied the total salary cost of next 15% by 5% with max of $5,000
5% for next 15%;
$5,000 cap Award a one-time bonus instead of a base Summed the two costs
salary increase to incentivize similar
performance the next year
25
Source: OPM personnel data for executive branch departments excluding constitutional, extra help, boards, pulled March 2024; BLS CPI data 2017-2023 All items in West South-Central
region (Arkansas), all urban consumers, not seasonally adjusted, pulled 4/22/2024
Preliminary budget implication scenarios:
Meet market minimum for all positions module (1/2)
Methodology Calculations used to create budget scenario
Assigning BLS SOC job families
• Subtract 10th, 25th, or 50th percentile of market rate
Used proprietary language learning algorithm to match
OPM position titles with BLS SOC job families salary and 10th percentile below market rate salary
Positions matched on title only, not skills and tenure from each position’s current salary to find the market
rate adjustment needed for each scenario
Defining the market
Scenarios: 10th,
• For General & Senior Executive positions with a
25th, and 50th Two markets used in analysis:
percentile of Neighboring states for medical, IT, and senior market rate adjustment exceeding $5,000, cap the
market rate and leadership grades and positions with limited private increase at $5,000
10th percentile sector comparators (corrections, police)
below market Arkansas rates for all other positions • For IT and Medical positions, no market rate
rate
adjustment cap applied
Determining market minimum
• Sum market rate adjustments for all positions to find
Matched SOC BLS job families in Lightcast aggregated
salary database to determine the below market rate total cost of raising filled and unfilled positions to the
options market minimum
Source: Lightcast Entry -level annual earnings data pulled 4/15/2024; OPM personnel data for executive branch departments excluding constitutional, extra help, 26
boards, pulled March 2024; Targeted position lists submitted by departments December 2023
Preliminary budget implication scenarios:
Meet market minimum for all positions module (2/2)
Positions below Preliminary 1 year cost scenarios, Preliminary 1 year cost scenarios,
market, # (%) total revenue general revenue
Scenario A: 3,093
10th percentile $21.24M $8.50M
market rate
(11)
6,334
Scenario B:
25th percentile $45.89M $18.36M
market rate (22)
Scenario C: 11,477
50th percentile $84.87M $33.95M
market rate
(39)
Scenario D: 1,065
10th percentile $9.15M $3.66M
below market rate1
(4)
1. Approximated from Lightcast data
Source: Lightcast Entry -level annual earnings data pulled 4/15/2024; OPM personnel data for executive branch departments excluding constitutional, extra help, 27
boards, pulled March 2024; Targeted position lists submitted by departments December 2023
Preliminary budget implication scenarios:
Pay incentives for OPM-selected “critical” job families module (1/3)
Job families selected by OPM for inclusion in “critical” job family budget scenario
• Correctional Officers and Jailers • Paralegals and Legal Assistants
• First-Line Supervisors of Correctional Officers • Lawyers
• Business Operations Specialists, All Other • General and Operations Managers
• Nursing Assistants • Budget analysts
• Eligibility Interviewers, Government Programs • HR Managers & Specialists
• Office and Administrative Support Workers • Accountants
• Customer Service Representatives • Financial Managers
• Social Workers, All Other • Software developer
• Registered Nurses • Computer systems analyst
• Medical and Health Services Managers • Database administrator
• Police and Sheriff's Patrol Officers • Information security analyst
Source: Targeted position lists submitted by departments December 2023; OPM selected critical job families in April 2024; OPM personnel data for executive 28
branch departments excluding constitutional, extra help, boards, pulled March 2024
Preliminary budget implication scenarios:
Pay incentives for OPM-selected “critical” job families module (2/3)
Methodology
Assigning BLS SOC job families Boundaries on pay increase
Used proprietary language learning algorithm to match OPM position Determined % increase over current actual salary of positions
titles with BLS SOC job families necessary to meet market minimum for critical positions
No greater than $5,000
No cap for IT and Medical positions
Determining market minimum OPM process for identifying critical job families
Matched SOC BLS job families in Lightcast aggregated salary Job families chosen with the following criteria:
database to determine market rate • Roles on target list submitted by departments
• Highest number of positions (>100)
Used the 10th,
25th, and 50th percentile of the state’s market salary
• Significant vacancy rates (>7%)
as a proxy for “entry level”
• Significant turnover rates (>7%)
Two markets used in analysis: • Ensured all 15 departments represented
Neighboring states for roles with limited private sector options
Arkansas rates for roles with large number of exit opportunities Final list selected by OPM
1. List can vary dependent upon priorities of position count, turnover, and vacancy rates
Source: Targeted position lists submitted by departments December 2023; OPM selected critical job families in April 2024; Lig htcast Entry-level annual earnings 29
data pulled 4/15/2024; OPM personnel data for executive branch departments excluding constitutional, extra help, boards, pulled March 2024
Preliminary budget implication scenarios:
Pay incentives for critical job families module (3/3)
Positions below Preliminary 1 year cost scenarios, Preliminary 1 year cost scenarios,
market, # (%) total revenue general revenue
Scenario A: 1,422
10th percentile $9.48M $3.79M
market rate (9)
2,672
Scenario B:
25th percentile $19.40M $7.76M
market rate (16)
Scenario C: 4,532
50th percentile $33.22M $13.29M
market rate (28)
Source: Lightcast Entry -level annual earnings data pulled 4/15/2024; OPM personnel data for executive branch departments excluding constitutional, extra help, 30
boards, pulled March 2024; Targeted position lists submitted by departments December 2023
Appendix 3: Illustrative pay plan
examples
31
Illustrative examples
for use of
compensation levers # Lever impacted # Lever not impacted
Compensation
Compensation levers 1 Illustrative example levers impacted
1 Pay table: Base salary for each Illustrative example 1: Employee meets performance expectations, 1 2
position classified into 1 of 6 tables resulting in a 1 step progression within their grade. They also
with multiple grades each2 receive a “spot” bonus given their team’s results on a major project.
3 4
2 Step increase to base salary:
Illustrative example 2: Employee does not meet performance 1 2
Annual salary increases within a
expectations and does not progress to the next step within their
grade contingent on experience and
grade. Their team received a spot bonus for results on a major
meeting baseline performance 3 4
project, but given the employee does not meet performance
expectations, the employee does not.
3 One-time annual bonuses: One-
time bonuses awarded to employees Illustrative example 3: Employee exceeds performance 1 2
who perform above baseline, not expectations (e.g., is top 10%) and receives a one-time bonus of
impacting base salaries 10% of their current salary3 and receives a 1 step progression within
their grade. 3 4
4 “Spot” bonuses: One-time bonuses
awarded outside of the normal Detailed illustrative examples to follow
evaluation cycle to teams or
employees contingent on employee 1.
2.
Compensation levers contingent upon other state government budget priorities
Lever 1 solely dictates which pay table an employee is on. The potential new approach has a design principle of compensation being linked to market competitiveness.
Therefore, pay tables can be adjusted based on variable market dynamics across major job categories. 6 pay tables include General, Information Technology, Medical,
meeting baseline performance, not Corrections (new), Law enforcement and Public Safety (new), and Professional Services (new). Additional pay tables can reflect material differences in labor market dynamics
across job categories and/or state government strategic workforce planning priorities (e.g., to address near-term recruitment and retention and/or invest in future capabilities).
impacting base salaries Bundling together job families into a few pay table can provide the nuance to calibrate compensation to different hiring, retention, and development needs. That said, each
additional pay table introduces analytic and administrative complexity. Consequently, there are advantages to approaches that limit the proliferation of pay tables toward
individual job families or even roles. That said, there may be specific exceptions meriting a separate pay table due to unique circumstances and context (e.g., executive
recruitment).
3. Based on Scenario D of “3. performance-based awards module”, which employs a one-time bonus of 10% for the top 10%, 5% for the next 15%, and a $5,000 employee bonus
32
cap
Illustrative example 1:
Meets performance expectations and receives a “spot” bonus
# Lever impacted # Lever not impacted
Role: Manager Compensation lever Compensation
impacted Impact to employee implication
Pay table: New Pay table (TBD)
1 Pay table1 Uses new pay table Determines base pay
(salary of $109,000)
Illustrative grade: XX09
2 Step increase to base Qualified for step Increases salary by
Illustrative step: 16 out of 20 salary increase (i.e., from step $2,000 to $111,000
16 to 17)
Illustrative salary: $109,000
3 One-time annual N/A N/A
bonuses
Performance: Employee meets
performance expectations, resulting 4 “Spot” bonus Mid-year bonus $1,000
in a 1 step progression within their
grade. They also receive a “spot” Illustrative current year Illustrative base compensation
bonus given their team’s results on a compensation: next year:
major project. $109,000 + $1,000 = $110,000 $111,000
1. In this illustrative example, pay for this step did not change in-year based on market dynamics
33
Illustrative example 2:
Does not meet performance expectations and receives no “spot” bonus
# Lever impacted # Lever not impacted
Role: Supervisor Compensation lever Compensation
impacted Impact to employee implication
Pay table: New pay table (TBD)
1 Pay table1 Uses new pay table Determines base pay
(salary of $116,000)
Illustrative grade: XX05
Illustrative step: 8 out of 20 2 Step increase to base N/A N/A
Illustrative salary: $116,000 salary
3 One-time annual N/A N/A
Performance: Employee does not
bonuses
meet performance expectations and
does not progress to the next step 4 “Spot” bonus N/A – baseline N/A
within their grade. Their team performance not met
received a spot bonus for results on a
major project, but given the employee Illustrative current year Illustrative base compensation
does not meet performance compensation: next year:
expectations, the employee does not. $116,000 $116,000
34
1. In this illustrative example, pay for this step did not change in-year based on market dynamics
Illustrative example 3:
Exceeds performance expectations
# Lever impacted # Lever not impacted
Role: Specialist Compensation lever Compensation
impacted Impact to employee implication
Pay table: New pay table (TBD) 1 Pay table2 Uses new pay table Determines base pay
(salary of $46,000)
Illustrative grade: XX06
2 Step increase to base Qualifies for step Increases salary by
Illustrative step: 13 out of 20 salary increase (i.e., from step $1,000 to $47,000
13 to 14)
Illustrative salary: $46,000 3 One-time annual Qualifies for one-time Increases annual
bonuses 10% bonus of current compensation by
Performance: Employee exceeds salary $4,600
performance expectations (e.g., is top 4 “Spot” bonus N/A N/A
10%) and receives a one-time bonus
of 10% of their current salary1 and Illustrative current year Illustrative base compensation
receives a 1 step progression within compensation: next year:
their grade. $46,000 + 4,600 = $50,600 $47,000
1. Based on Scenario D of “3. performance-based awards module”, which employs a one-time bonus of 10% for the top 10%, 5% for the next 15%, and a $5,000 employee bonus cap
2. In this illustrative example, pay for this step did not change in-year based on market dynamics 35
Step pay table example:
Enterprise approach to pay table
Kansas Civil Service pay plan, FY24
Source: Kansas Civil Service Pay Plan 36
Step pay table example:
Job family or functional approach to pay table
Louisiana State Police pay schedule, FY24
37
Source: Louisiana State Police;
Step pay table example:
Role-specific pay table
Alabama Executive Assistant I pay plan, FY24
38
Source: Alabama State Personnel Department
Peer state reference example:
“Min-Max” pay table
Georgia Statewide Salary Structure, FY24 Select insights
Georgia’s Department of Administrative Services
(DOAS) is responsible for establishing,
maintaining and implementing the state’s
classification and compensation structure
82% of employees in executive branch agencies
are covered under the Statewide Salary Plan
(SWD)
Source: Georgia Statewide Salary Structure 39
Peer state reference example:
“Min-Max” pay table by job description
Tennessee Compensation Plan (non-exhaustive)1, FY24 Select insights
The Division of
Classification and
Compensation consults
with state agencies to
determine strategies to
meet departmental
classification and
compensation objectives
This division also trains
agency employees to
develop job analysis, write
job specifications and
choose knowledge, skills,
abilities and competencies
for positions
1. Table shows one of sixty-five pages with state job descriptions 40
Source: Tennessee Classification and Compensation
Peer state reference example:
“Min-Max” pay table
Texas Statewide Salary Rates – Schedule A, FY24 Select insights
Texas has three salary schedules
that cover all classified positions
‒ Schedule A: Administrative
support, maintenance, technical
and paraprofessional positions
‒ Schedule B – Mainly
professional and managerial
positions
‒ Schedule C – Commissioned
law enforcement positions
Salary schedules are established
by the Legislature during the
biennial budget process
Source: Texas State Auditor’s Office 41
Peer state reference example:
“Min-Max” pay table
Arizona Statewide Salary Structure (non -exhaustive), FY24 Select insights
Arizona’s Department
of Administration
(ADOA) provides full
classification and
compensation
services for agencies
in the Arizona State
Personnel System
Strategies, such as
criteria-based
adjustment, goal-
based incentive, may
be available to
agencies after
consultation with
ADOA’s Human
Resources Division
Source: Arizona Classification and Compensation 42
Potential pay table development & implementation process (1/2)
Continued on following page
1 Determine number of 2 Prioritize tables for 3 Determine salary range for each table
pay tables development
The number of pay tables depends upon a Ideally, all pay tables would be revised or The appropriate range for salaries by grades within a pay table depend on several factors including:
system’s guiding design principles. For introduced simultaneously for considerations
• Budget priorities
instance, some organizations opt for of both consistency in approach and
consistency across all job families and, strategic workforce planning priorities. • Historical baseline of current salaries and pay tables (e.g., grades, min-max ranges or steps, etc.)
therefore, adopt a single integrated pay table
If timing and/or capacity limit such an • Relative market dynamics (e.g., median salaries for representative roles and job families; other labor market
(e.g., Kansas). The potential new approach
approach, then potential considerations for dynamics)
for Arkansas instead emphasizes the design
prioritization among new tables for
principle of market competitiveness. • Strategic workforce planning priorities – near-term (e.g., addressing recruitment, retention, promotion
development include:
Consequently, the potential number of pay challenges) and longer-term (e.g., investing in future capabilities)
Near-term workforce challenges: Job
tables can be adjusted based on variable categories with acute recruitment and/or • Promoting performance and continuous improvement culture (e.g., ranges that enable flexibility for
market dynamics across the relevant major retention challenges (indicated by high appropriate recognition, reward, and advancement; steps that incentivize performance)
job categories as well as potential state vacancy or turnover rates) would be
government strategic workforce planning • Career ladders for managers and Subject Matter Experts.
candidates for early prioritization to
priorities (e.g., to address near-term calibrate to market competitiveness Regular independent compensation analyses (e.g., linked to budget cycle) can support the establishment and
recruitment and retention and/or invest in dynamics then ongoing “maintenance” of pay tables to ensure alignment with budget and other management priorities with
future capabilities). local market dynamics. The specific detailed scale and scope of such independent specialized expert support
Ease of implementation leveraging
Bundling together job families into a few other states’ experience: Some depends on the data and services offered by the vendor as well as the capabilities/capacity of the state’s internal
overall pay tables can provide the nuance to potential pay tables could be adapted team.
calibrate compensation to different hiring, from other state’s existing approach due Separate from the salary ranges in any table per se is the question of compensation of senior government and
retention, and development needs along to underlying similarity of approach agency leaders to other staff and experts. As a general design principle, typically the senior ranking official (e.g.,
with overall administrative efficiency. Supporting new expert career department secretary) is the most compensated. However, there are also exceptions both in private and public
Exceptions separate pay table due to unique ladders: The implementation of new sector to such a design principle. These typically involve differential compensation to recruit and retain
circumstances and context (e.g., executive career ladders may in some job specialized technical expertise where the underlying market dynamics differ from even senior executive
recruitment). categories benefit from revising existing positions. For instance, currently, the State of Arkansas’ most highly compensated civil servants (outside of the
pay tables to accommodate potential university system) are medical examiners. In other states, roles such as Chief Information Officer or Medicaid
The potential approach includes tables for new non-managerial tracks for Subject Director are sometimes compensated more than their respective agency leaders. In the private sector, software
General, Information Technology, Medical, Matter Experts and other specialists engineers often have higher salaries than the product managers to whom they report. The more fundamental
Corrections (new), Law enforcement and design principle across these examples is the linking of salaries to market dynamics and an organization’s
Public Safety (new), and Professional strategic and operational priorities.
Services (new), as well as senior
executives.
43
Potential pay table development & implementation process (2/2)
4 Evaluate financial impact 5 Understand potential implementation
challenges
As the pay tables are developed, the financial impact can be Potential implementation challenges, with different timelines,
assessed based on number of employees impacted, net change include:
in pay, etc., and the implementation can be staggered to ensure • Calibration: The implementation of the pay tables may be
costs remain within budget. Preliminary budget implications for challenged if either the underlying job classifications and role
different scenarios based upon initial estimates calculated by definitions are not appropriately defined and calibrated with
OPM staff are in Appendix 2. each other, or if the placement of specific roles onto tables is
done without a consistent methodology
• Effectiveness: The pay tables may not be fully competitive
for the state’s workforce objectives in practice (e.g., definition
of “competitiveness” level based upon market medians).
Therefore, regular and consistent data collection and
analysis of core performance metrics (e.g., recruitment,
retention, promotion) is needed to identify potential
opportunities for adjustment
• Maintenance: The potential new approach emphasizing
market competitiveness depends upon regular “maintenance”
of pay tables – involving regular labor market analyses and
adjustments synchronized with the biannual budget process.
Without regular calibration, pay tables can become out of
synch and therefore require significant adjustments in future
years with potential negative budgetary impacts.
44
Skills-based talent management: Overview of trends
State governments and the National Governors states and territories have recently removed degree requirements
Association are helping raise awareness of workers 21+ potentially doubling their talent pool for 445k+ good jobs
that are Skilled Through Alternative Routes
(STARs) rather than a bachelor’s degree
This movement builds upon early private sector
efforts – led largely by technology companies – to
move to skills-based talent management practices
While ~70% of new jobs 2009-2019 were in areas
where employers typically require a 4-year degree
50% of the US workforce are STARs
with valuable skills from military
service, community college,
training programs, partial college
completion, or on-the-job
experience
70M STARs in the US represent half
of white workers and a majority
of Black, Latino/Latina, Rural,
and Veteran workers
Source: Opportunity@Work; National Governors Association; https://whiteboardadvisors.com/states-embrace-skills-based-hiring/ 45
Skills-based talent management: implementation considerations
While each state government’s experience in adopting skills-based talent management practices is unique, some
common patterns have emerged…
Horizon 1: Formal adoption Horizon 2: Adapting systems and practices
Executive Order or legislative action to mandate skills-based practices Improving end-to-end applicant experience (e.g., job postings, application,
across government agencies interview, onboarding) to improve awareness among and increase application
‒ Such actions often focus on removal of degree requirements from job rates among STARs
descriptions and recruiting practices for most roles
‒ Exceptions include roles requiring, by statute or regulation, specific Shifting legacy behaviors and mindsets among HR staff and hiring
professional certifications) managers to achieve real implementation of new approach (e.g., change
management with HR and hiring managers, trainings) to counteract continued
interview and other practices that favor degree candidates
Identification of classifications and jobs that can be skills-based
Review of job descriptions to remove formal degree requirements Revising talent management practices by translating credential and/or
“years experience” requirements to specific competencies and by developing
new assessment methodologies (e.g., including resume review, interview,
Initial training of HR staff and hiring managers in implementing new formal simulations, reference checks)
policies
Defining and instituting a measurement approach (e.g., establishing new
Note: Many states report the initial formal adoption of new policies alone assessment frameworks, tracking outcomes, creating a performance
does not significantly change actual practice and, therefore, performance framework)
because the underlying systems, behaviors, and relationships continue to
operate unchanged. Some states have moved to Horizon 2 implementation Developing pipelines for additional pathways into roles (e.g., developing a
pipeline with critical institutions such as community colleges; opportunity to
focus on apprenticeships, veteran transition)
Source: Opportunity@Work; National Governors Association; https://whiteboardadvisors.com/states-embrace-skills-based-hiring/ ; interviews 46
Skills-based talent management: case examples
Maryland Colorado Washington
Maryland was the first state to adopt formally Colorado was the second state to make an Washington is currently in the process of
by Executive Order skills based-hiring, Executive Order to remove unnecessary formalizing its statewide policies for skills-
eliminating degree requirements for half of degree requirements from state roles. Since based talent management. To date, they
the state’s public sector jobs via an then, they have: have:
executive order, primarily for roles across IT, Identified of classifications and jobs that Engaged hiring managers, recruiters, and
customer service, and administration. can be skills-based department leadership in 6-month
In the first year, hires increased by 41% Implemented skills-based identifiers in process to explain, “co-build,” and align
– an early indicator that the elimination of ~50% of jobs upon skills-based approach
degree requirements helped broaden the Established a goal for 80% of jobs to be Identified top 50 job categories with
talent pool for hard-to-fill jobs automatically listed as skills-based greatest potential impact for detailed
Launched pilot partnership program Started mandatory trainings for skills- competency definition (e.g.,
with the Association of Community based hiring practices administrative assistants, civil engineers,
College Trustees, the State of Maryland, social workers)
Begun tracking initial metrics for
Opportunity@Work, and four pilot Developed template for revamped job
positions posted as skills-based
Maryland Community Colleges to create descriptions including competency
a pipeline of skilled and career-ready job Identified roadmap to move to “Horizon 2”
requirements and assessment
candidates for open roles implementation focused on improved
methodologies
applicant experience and hiring manager
skill building
Source: Opportunity@Work; National Governors Association; https://whiteboardadvisors.com/states-embrace-skills-based-hiring/ ; press reporting; interviews 47
Appendix 4: Potential implementation
timelines
48
Potential implementation timeline – overview
2024 2025 Ramp up phase
Element of new
system Activity May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Details
Finalize specific design elements Appendix 3: p43
Develop updated pay tables Appendix 3: p43
Assign all jobs to new pay tables Appendix 2: p26, Appendix 3: p43
Salaries Refresh market analysis to link to market dynamics Appendix 2: p24, Appendix 3: p43
linked to
market Incorporate new pay plan approach into overall budget Appendix 2: p24-30, Appendix 3: p44
dynamics New pay tables finalized
with
Launch change management efforts Appendix 7: p 73-76
performance
bonuses1
Undergo legislative review and approval
Prepare for implementation Appendix 3: p43-44
New pay tables launched (at FY)
Conduct rapid assessment and review of current classification structure
Conduct OPM and SME workshops to identify initial priority career ladders
Develop priority career ladders
Crosswalk with existing classifications
Skills-based
career Review and refine role descriptions
ladders and Refine skills and qualifications needed
role
Align with pay tables
classification2
Deliver department HR trainings
Map current team members to new roles
Roll out new approach with change management Appendix 7: p73-75, 75
New career paths launched and updated classification structure implemented (at FY)
Finalize design elements for updated PE system Appendix 6: p68-72
Host workshops with departments to develop evaluation criteria Appendix 5: p60, 62, 64
Finalize evaluation criteria Appendix 5: p60, 62, 64
Approach to Develop platform and training materials for the new system Appendix 5: p66
promote
development Pilot new system with select population(s) and adjust as-needed
and Develop website and comms, establish change champion network, and train trainers Appendix 5: p63
performance3
Launch communications rollout and launch updated PE system
Roll out new approach with change management, conduct state-wide training, and Appendix 7: p73-75,78-81
Confirm individual expectations and goals for year
Complete first FY25 evaluations
1. Additional detail on design elements and market dynamics scenarios in Appendix 2, and illustrative pay plan examples and implementation considerations in Appendix 3
2. Select case examples of state experiences with skills-based career ladders included in Appendix 3. Change management considerations outlined in Appendix 7 49
3. Additional detail on performance evaluation included in Appendix 5. Design considerations in Appendix 6. Change management considerations outlined in Appendix 7
Arkansas Forward revised pay structure plan potential implementation:
Salaries linked to market dynamics with performance bonuses
Ramp up phase
2024 2025
Activity JunJul AugSepOctNovDecJanFebMarAprMayJunJul Details
Finalize specific design elements, e.g., Appendix 3: p43
• New pay tables (e.g., law enforcement, legal)
• Number of steps (% annual increase for baseline performance)
• Annual bonus structure (e.g., top 10% receive 10%, next 15%
receive 5%, $5,000 cap)
Develop updated pay tables (e.g., defined salary range, step number) Appendix 3: p43
Assign all jobs to new pay tables Appendix 2: p26, Appendix 3: p43
Refresh market analysis to link to market dynamics Appendix 2: p24, Appendix 3: p43
Incorporate new pay plan approach into overall budget Appendix 2: p24-30, Appendix 3: p44
New pay tables finalized
Launch change management efforts Appendix 7: p73-76
Undergo legislative review and approval
Prepare for FY26 implementation (e.g., future implementation cost Appendix 3: p44
modeling, prepare and share reporting)
New pay tables launched (at FY)
Detailed sub-activities to follow
50
Detail:
Salaries linked to market dynamics with performance bonuses
Activity Sub-activity
Finalize specific design elements Identify relevant best practices in pay plan design
Determine number of pay tables needed
Calculate compensation ranges for each pay table
Assign classifications to relevant pay table
Determine annual bonus structure for pay plans
Develop updated pay tables Develop step increments for each pay table based on compensation ranges
Assign all jobs to new pay tables Identify mobility and placement methodology for each pay table
Gain approval of mobility and placement methodology for each pay table
Match each job to new pay tables
Refresh market analysis to link to market Develop and share data analysis plan
dynamics Develop data collection tools and identify targets and benchmarks
Collect and verify peer data
Analyze peer compensation structures and operational methodologies
Analyze market data to identify relative market position by job families and levels
Incorporate approach into budget Merge budgetary impacts of pay plan into the overall budget
Undergo legislative review and approval Submit new pay plan approach to legislature for review
Prepare for FY26 implementation Estimate placement cost for each incumbent
Model future cost of implementation
Prepare and share briefing of process and results
Gather feedback on recommendations
Draft and share summary report
51
Arkansas Forward revised pay structure plan potential implementation:
Skills-based career ladders and role classification
Ramp up phase
2024 2025
Activity May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Details
Conduct OPM and SME workshops to conduct rapid assessment
and identify initial priority career ladders
Develop priority career ladders
Crosswalk with existing classifications
Review and refine role descriptions (i.e., eliminating
department-specific classifications)
Refine skills and qualifications needed (e.g., introduce elements
of skills-based practices)
Align with pay tables
Deliver department HR trainings
Map current team members to new roles
Roll out new approach with change management Appendix 7: p73-75, 77
New career paths launched (at FY)
Updated classification structure implemented (at FY)
Detailed sub-activities to follow
52
Detail:
Skills-based career ladders and role classification (1/2)
Activity Sub-activity
Conduct rapid assessment OPM project team reviews current 2000+ classifications for areas of obvious consolidation/streamlining (e.g.
and review of current similar titles across all departments, 5 or 6 levels of progression that could be pared down to 2-3)
classification structure
OPM project team meets with all departments to explain the goal of this effort is to create skill -based career
ladders to provide more flexible yet meaningful development paths
Conduct OPM and SME OPM and department HR meet to workshop OPM review of classifications, how updated classification
workshops to identify initial structure can fit into specialized technical career progressions, which classifications can be bucketed into a
priority career ladders general career ladder, and who needs to be part of developing specific ladder development
Develop priority career Separate SME teams will create career ladders for job families
ladders
Crosswalk with existing OPM and department SMEs work together to crosswalk existing classifications
classifications
Review and refine role OPM and department SMEs work together to review and refine role descriptions
descriptions
Refine skills and OPM and department SMEs work together to refine skills and qualifications needed
qualifications needed
Align with pay tables Analyze how new structure will impact budget
53
Detail:
Skills-based career ladders and role classification (2/2)
Activity Sub-activity Owner Dates
Deliver department HR OPM team to hold in person training with department HR teams, with all sessions recorded for as-needed
trainings refreshers
OPM team to implement new structure into existing HRIS system
Map current team members Place each team member into new structure
to new roles
Roll out new approach with Engage with staff through face -to-face and offline channels (e.g., regular feedback meetings, digital feedback
change management tools such as surveys)
Develop and deploy trainings for the new career paths and classification structure, including what they are,
their value proposition, and how they will impact employees
New career paths launched Deploy new career paths throughout the organization
(at FY)
Updated classification Implement updated classification structure
structure implemented (at
FY)
54
Arkansas Forward revised performance evaluation plan potential
implementation
Ramp up phase
2024 2025
Activity May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Details
Finalize design elements for updated PE system Appendix 6: p68-72
Host workshops with departments to develop evaluation criteria Appendix 5: p60, 62, 64
Finalize evaluation criteria Appendix 5: p60, 62, 64
Develop PE system platform Appendix 5: p66
Develop training and FAQ materials
Pilot PE with select population(s)
Adjust based on pilot
Develop website and communications for program Appendix 5: p63
Establish change champion network
Train the trainers
Launch communications rollout
Launch updated PE system
Roll out new approach with change management Appendix 7: p73-75,78-81
Conduct state-wide trainings
Confirm individual expectations and goals for year
Complete first FY 25 evaluations
Detailed sub-activities to follow
55
Detail:
Revised performance evaluation plan (1/2)
Activity Sub-activity
Finalize plan for updated PE Assign implementation owner to document project plan with as many details as possible
system
Form implementation teams
Share and communicate plan with all involved
Decide on a name for the PE system
Host workshops with Hold multiple workshops across the state with HR teams, HR directors, deputy directors to gather feedback and develop near fi nal design
departments to develop on topics like questions for self assessment/evaluation and timing of semi-annual evaluations
evaluation criteria
Finalize evaluation criteria AR Forward to leverage input from workshops to finalize items from workshops
Develop PE system platform IT team develops a comprehensive performance evaluation system with an evaluation tool, upward feedback tool, dashboards for results
based on HRIS hierarchy
Develop training and FAQ Trainer/graphic design team create trainings for managers, team members, leadership, and trainers on specific topics relevant to them
materials
Pilot PE with select Finalize segments of workforce to pilot new PE approach to pressure test potential implementation challenges 1
population(s)
Conduct pilot as closely to what reality will look like as possible
OPM project team ensures that feedback is incorporated at each step via a variety of mediums to promote response rates
Adjust based on pilot OPM project team will present feedback data to AR Forward along with pros/cons of each suggestion.
Decide on adjustments that are able to be incorporated into final design versus ones for future implementation
Ensure adjustments are made in technology
Ensure adjustments are made in all trainings
Develop website and IT team develop a website to house direct links to tools and dashboards, training content, additional resources, and help information
communications for program
1. Pilot design should balance administrative practicality with ability to collect insights to inform potential revision before final roll out across whole of government. Such a pilot should test across all agency
functions, and also major implementation challenges such as Little Rock headquarters versus field offices, senior staff versus frontline staff, office versus remote, and standard working hours versus 56
shift work. A potential balanced approach would include: a small department to pilot across an entire single agency (e.g., Agriculture) supplemented by piloting in divisions in a larger department with
more extensive field operations and frontline care facilities with 24-hour shift work (e.g., Department of Human Services) .
Detail:
Revised performance evaluation plan (2/2)
Activity Sub-activity
Establish change champion Establish change champions from each department to answer questions on new performance management system and provide feedback
network to the OPM team
Train the trainers Training team conducts detailed training on each topic with department trainers with focus on how to conduct in person traini ng for
managers
Launch communications Hold frequent formal sessions (e.g., workshops, focus groups, regular feedback meetings) and informal sessions (e.g., one -off discussions
rollout with specific stakeholders) to generate alignment on updated system
Launch updated PE system Launch new system, including sending statewide email and beginning manager training
Roll out new approach with Communication team works closely with OPM program team to ensure that a statewide email in sent mid - December
change management
Communication team works with department trainers to schedule trainings for all managers in the months of January and Februar y
Communication team and OPM create detailed timeline and templates for all communications over the first calendar year of the program
Communication team and OPM program team to develop communications plan for roll out and implementation
Conduct state-wide trainings Department trainers schedule multiple trainings around the state so that each manager attends in person training
Training team collects feedback from training to decide what should go into ongoing training for new managers
Develop a plan for new/incoming managers to be trained
Confirm individual expectations Work with incoming managers to confirm the expectations and goals for their direct reports for the year
and goals for year
Complete first FY 25 Ensure OPM “helpdesk” is ready to answer questions
evaluations Conduct first “calibration” analysis across and within departments. Results to inform adjustment of feedback as appropriate 57
and manager coaching to reinforce new performance standards and approach
Appendix 5: Performance evaluation
case study
58
State case study: Missouri’s move to simplified performance evaluation
system and intensive manager-staff dialogues
Objective: Approach:
The State of Missouri redesigned its Office of Administration Division of Personnel
approach to performance evaluation (Engage used feedback to spearhead the design effort
2.0) in order to: with subject matter experts
Team members, HR directors and deputy
Provide meaningful performance and
directors from 15 of 16 executive branch
development coaching
departments participated in interviews, focus
Keep the process simple so the focus groups, workshops to:
remains on our people ‒ Evaluate what (if anything) should be
preserved from old system
Identify and recognize people for great
‒ Collect suggestions for what a meaningful
performance (”above and beyond”)
evaluation system would look like
Provide data and analytics to support more ‒ Assess options and best practices
consistent feedback Initial design was piloted with 1000 team
members within two diverse agencies
(Department of Mental Health and
Department of Agriculture)
Source: Expert interviews; Missouri Office of Administration Division of Personnel 59
State case study: Missouri adopted a simplified evaluation to enable
more frequent evaluations from multiple managers to guide check ins
Engage 2.0 Evaluation questions
• Reduced
cumbersome
process to most
fundamental
questions to
assess
performance
• Evaluation tool
configured for use
on computer,
laptop, or mobile
device
• Reduced
evaluation time to
minutes, saving
100k+ hours per
year
Source: Missouri Office of Administration Division of Personnel 60
State case study: More frequent reporting and analytical capabilities
enables managers to monitor growth and calibrate across divisions
Engage 2.0 Performance dashboard
• Provided
transparency
within and across
departments for
consistency of
ratings
• Approach
designed to help
identify potential
pockets of “grade
inflation” in ratings
– and thereby
enabled manager
calibration
discussions mid-
year
Source: Missouri Office of Administration Division of Personnel 61
State case study:
Evaluation and upward feedback mechanisms – example frameworks
Never Rarely Sometimes Often Always
Evaluation of direct Based on my observations, this person always delivers
reports excellent results in their day-to-day role.
Based on my observations, this person always
goes above and beyond their normal job responsibilities.
Based on my observations, this person consistently
demonstrates a commitment to grow and learn.
Upward feedback of
I feel connected to my supervisor.
supervisors
I clearly understand what is expected of me in my role.
I receive meaningful feedback from my supervisor that
helps me improve my performance.
I receive recognition for a job well done from my
supervisor.
I am challenged to grow professionally by my supervisor.
My supervisor removes barriers so that I can do my job
effectively.
Source: Missouri Office of Administration Division of Personnel 62
State case study:
Example website and
supporting material
Example website Example supporting material
Upward feedback reference guide Training materials
FAQs
Source: Missouri Engage 2.0 website 63
Example common individual performance evaluation questions
Guiding principles Example questions – scored on a 5-point Likert “agreement” scale
Semi-annual individual Illustrative examples
performance evaluations should
focus on the most important Focus theme and description
management expectations and Individual role expectations: Based on my observations, this individual
priorities for all staff always meets their responsibilities in their day-to-day work.
The questions should also be
limited to improve efficiency (i.e., Individual impact: Based on my observations, this individual consistently
less time devoted to process delivers impact beyond normal job responsibilities
over substance)
Individual improvement: Based on my observations, this individual
The evaluations should be
consistently improves their skills and approach to fulling their job
based upon observations
responsibilities
relative to clearly defined job
responsibilities and expectations
Team role: Based on my observations, this individual is a positive team
The evaluation scales should member and contributes to the team’s improved performance
reinforce high performance
standards Customer-focus: Based on my observations, this individual can identify
their customers (internal and/or external) and consistently provides
excellent customer experience in their day-to-day work
64
Potential performance score calculation example
ILLUSTRATIVE
Questions are
scored on a 5-part
Likert “agreement”
Question Score scale
Question 1: Based on my observations, this individual always meets 5
their responsibilities in their day-to-day work
Question 2: Based on my observations, this individual consistently 2
delivers impact beyond normal job responsibilities
Question 3: Based on my observations, this individual consistently 3
improves their skills and approach to fulfilling their job responsibilities
Question 4: Based on my observations, this individual is a positive 3
team member and contributes to the team’s improved performance
Question 5: Based on my observations, this individual can identify their customers 4 Question scores
and consistently provides excellent customer experience in their day-to-day work are averaged into
an overall
Overall score (avg.) 3.1 performance
evaluation score
65
Potential capabilities for a performance management platform
ILLUSTRATIVE NON-EXHAUSTIVE
Sample performance
Capability considerations management platforms
Gathering feedback Analysis Security
Customizable/flexible Automatic rating Account level access
survey creation and calculation based on permissions
timing custom weighting Integration with existing
Email notification/ Calibration analysis IAM
reminders Visualize/rank across Meets state required
Responsive web portal group, function, and cybersecurity
for survey creation and entire org. regulations
completion Track rating trends over
time (both recipient and
respondent)
Source: 2,000+ state and local contracts using "human resource management software" as keyword 66
Appendix 6: Performance evaluation
system design parameters – private
sector examples
67
Potential design elements for annual performance evaluation approach
Design element Range of options
A.1 Input
Potential future
performance
Supervisor Multiple supervisors 360 review
evaluation system
Multiple supervisors and
peers
A.2 Frequency
Current
Monthly Quarterly Semi-annual Annual performance
A.3 Specificity of
evaluation system
questions Verbal and Guiding questions (e.g., Detailed matrix
individualized 5-10) (e.g., 100+ questions)
A.4 Evaluation
focus1
Individual Individual + immediate Individual + organization Organization
team
A.5 Potential additional Upward feedback Self-assessment
features Team members submit anonymous, non- Employees submit a self-evaluation
consequential feedback to their managers semi-annually
Multiple points of input Robust “calibration” score
Other employees who have had significant Score reflecting averages of multiple
exposure during the review cycle provide input dimensions instead of a single whole
number rating
1. This potential focus is for the annual review process. “Spot” bonus awards could be provided based upon individual or team performance 68
Private sector examples:
Number and relationship of reviewers
= potential inspiration for Arkansas
Level of input
Multiple Multiple supervisors
Supervisor supervisors & peers 360 review
In practice
Benefits and Simplest to execute More complex to manage Provides more wholistic Emphasizes
challenges but provides but provides opportunities view of employee but accountability to direct
potentially limited with cross-function and potentially increasingly reports
perspective project work for more subjective (e.g.,
employee rounded view of inconsistent calibration)
employee
Considerations Status quo option Potential implementation Not every position has Difficult to manage
for Arkansas for the state complexity, depending sufficient peer positions across entire workforce
upon system Would require change Would require change
management among management among staff
staff for calibration for calibration
Source: Expert interviews; Harvard Business Review; Literature review
69
Private sector examples:
Frequency of reviews
= potential inspiration for Arkansas
Quarterly+ Semi-annually Annually
In practice
Benefits and Potentially requires larger Allows managers to develop Concentrates time
challenges time commitment from more rounded feedback commitment for managers in
managers but allows them to throughout the year, and intense period and less
trace skill and development more frequent structured frequent feedback increases
progression more closely to feedback to improve both risks of “recency bias”
improve performance performance and
dialogues and ratings development
Considerations Increasing frequency Increasing frequency Status quo option for the state
for Arkansas expectation would likely expectation would likely
need to be coupled with need to be coupled with
change management as part change management as part
of broader transformation in of broader transformation in
manager expectations manager expectations
Source: Expert interviews; Harvard Business Review; Literature review
70
Private sector examples:
Standardization and complexity of reviews
= potential inspiration for Arkansas
Verbal and Guiding questions Detailed matrix
individualized (e.g., 5-10) (e.g., 100+ questions)
In practice
Benefits and Can be tailored to reflect an A standardized and short list of Opportunity for detailed feedback,
challenges individual’s specific growth and questions or criteria to focus on but time-consuming process and
development plan linked to most important topics and spur proliferation of questions and criteria
overall goals, but can be meaningful feedback with can overwhelm managers and staff
subjective and insufficient focused time commitment reviewers to optimize for speed and
completion over quality input
Considerations Given the size of the workforce, Standardization across varying Status quo option for the state
for Arkansas this level of customization could departments to be monitored and
be difficult to implement and managed, and change
manage consistently management as part of broader
transformation in manager
expectations
Source: Expert interviews; Harvard Business Review; Literature review; University of Arkansas 71
Private sector examples:
Evaluation focus
= potential inspiration for Arkansas
Individual + Individual +
Individual immediate team organization Organization
In practice
Benefits and Focuses actionable Situates the individual Considers the outcomes of Solely looks at the outcomes
challenges feedback tailored to the in their team context the entire organization with of the organization as a
individual but and introduces team individual performance, reflection of the individual,
potentially reduces outcomes, which can possibly introducing potentially risking the
team incentives and motivate performance additional pressure individual development and
development and collaboration accountability
Considerations Status quo option for Difficult to implement and Difficult to implement and Risk eroding individual
for Arkansas the state standardize – not every standardize – as a public accountability
individual is part of a team enterprise, outcomes are Difficult to implement and
with clearly defined and not as easily measured or standardize – difficult to
measurable outcomes quantified as many other define and measure success
organizations for departments as whole
Source: Expert interviews; Harvard Business Review; Literature review 72
Appendix 7: Change management plan
73
Change management risks
Decision-makers may not understand the reasoning and/or may not support adjusting salaries for some job
Salaries linked to categories without commensurate adjustments elsewhere (for new pay tables adjusting to market conditions)
market dynamics with Employees not receiving market pay adjustments via new pay tables may feel the decision is unfair
performance bonuses
Hiring managers may not understand the distinction between the new skill-based hiring approach compared
Skills-based career to tenure or other metrics used to indicate experience and skills
ladders and role Hiring managers may exhibit bias toward credentials inconsistent with new job descriptions and hiring criteria
classification
Managers may not take make a meaningful shift to focus on development and performance with the use of
Approach to promote the new performance evaluation tool (instead continuing to treat it as a perfunctory exercise and/or a means
development and to engineer desired salary adjustment outcomes)
performance Employees may not use the feedback to make meaningful improvements in their performance or
development
74
The Influence Model is a research-based change management framework
that could be applied to Arkansas to mitigate change management risks
4 1
Role modeling Understanding & conviction
Senior leader/senior team Change story
4 1 role modeling
Symbolic acts
Ongoing, 2-way communications
Language and rituals
“I choose Influencing of leaders
to change my
mindset and
behavior if …” 3 2
3 2 Confidence &
skill-building
Reinforcement with
formal mechanisms
Technical and relational skills Structures and systems
Field-and-forum programs Processes
Recruitment of new talent pool Incentives
Successful transformations are 8 times more likely to use all four quadrants of the Influence Model than to use just one
Source: McKinsey People & Organization Performance (POP) practice 75
Mitigation approaches for change management risks
Salaries linked to market dynamics with performance bonuses
Role modeling Understanding & conviction
• Governor celebrates the recruitment and retention impacts of the Governor shares a video message and/or statement to entire
changes on a quarterly basis workforce with a personal “change story” on why these pay
adjustments are needed
• Cabinet meetings include as standard practice celebration of Department leaders (especially those that do NOT have employees
performance and success stories with the new salary with pay adjustments) express support for the adjustments in written
adjustments communications and in other informal opportunities (e.g., in staff
meetings, a video message, employee town halls)
Governor, legislative liaisons, and department leaders meet with
legislators to communicate the approach and seek buy-in
Confidence & skill-building Reinforcement with formal mechanisms
Managers in the affected departments with salary adjustments As a matter of policy, results of recruitment and retention
are trained on the changes and how to appropriately apply the improvements with the new pay table are periodically evaluated and
performance bonuses adjusted to keep with market changes
76
Mitigation approaches for change management risks
Skills-based career ladders and role classification
Role modeling Understanding & conviction
• Cabinet meetings include as standard practice celebration of • Governor shares video message to entire Arkansas state workforce with
successes in skill-based hiring personal “change story” on why the shift to skill-based hiring is important
• Leadership visibly and actively participate in skill-based hiring • Department leader communicates case for skill-based hiring (e.g.,
workshops and trainings importance of skill-based hiring in meetings with leadership, video
message to department employees, and in employee town halls)
• Senior department leaders hold regular development dialogues with
their own how skill-based hiring is workingg and how to improve • Change champions – Leaders are trained to answer questions on skill-
based hiring and are deployed to build excitement
• Department leaders hold informal “pulse checks” with employees and
change champions to listen, coach, role model, and explain the • Success stories of new skill-based hires are communicated frequently to
changes (e.g., “brown bag lunch,” “management by walking around”) drive conviction (hiring successes and post-hiring successes)
Confidence & skill-building Reinforcement with formal mechanisms
• Coaching capability building workshop series developed and launched for • Semi-annual review of results of the new skill-based hiring approach is
all senior leaders and managers on skill-based hiring conducted, including fidelity to the intent of skill-based hiring rather than
credential-based
• New online training modules and learning paths developed for leaders to
understand how to evaluate candidates under a skill-based hiring • Explicit expectation for training of all department HR leaders and hiring
approach and to avoid bias toward legacy approaches managers on skill-based hiring
• Skill-based hiring website with supporting resources for managers (e.g.,
training materials, guides, FAQs) developed and routinely updated
77
Mitigation approaches for change management risks (1/4)
Promoting development and performance
Role modeling
• Cabinet meetings include as standard practice celebration of performance and professional development success stories (e.g., individual
and team performance leading to continuous improvement, distinctive citizen impact, etc.)
• Leadership visibly and actively participate in capability building workshops and trainings for new performance approach (e.g., tangible
investment of time to signal priority to team)
• Senior department leaders hold regular development dialogues with their own direct reports, including coaching on how direct reports are
developing and how are they can coach their teams
• Department leaders hold informal “pulse checks” with employees and change champions to listen, coach, role model, and explain change
(e.g., “brown bag lunch,” “management by walking around”)
78
Mitigation approaches for change management risks (2/4)
Promoting development and performance
Understanding & Conviction
• Governor shares video message to entire Arkansas state workforce with personal “change story” (e.g., why this change
matters)
• Department leader communicates case for change to teams (e.g., importance of performance and professional
development to individual, team, and state success for citizens). Example communications include:
• Sharing “change story” in senior staff meetings
• Holding one-on-one with division directors and deputies
• Developing video message to share across department
• Hosting town hall meetings to share progress and answer questions
• Change champions – networks of team members from each department who are trained to answer questions on new
performance management system and provide feedback to the OPM team – are identified and deployed to build
excitement and energy around launch
• Success is communicated frequently to drive conviction (e.g., every senior staff meeting begins with a performance or
development success story)
79
Mitigation approaches for change management risks (3/4)
Promoting development and performance
Confidence & skill-building
• Coaching capability building workshop series developed and launched for all senior leaders and managers, with features
such as in-person role play exercises and knowledge checks
• New online training modules and learning paths developed for leaders to improve skills related to performance evaluation
and professional development of teams
• New peer coaching program for leaders established – including program to identify and train peer coaches in every
department
• Introduction to performance and professional development fundamentals integrated into onboarding of new employees
(e.g., how to provide and receive feedback)
• Website with supporting resources for managers (e.g., training materials, guides, FAQs) developed and routinely updated
80
Strategic Management Plan:
Arkansas Department of Agriculture
Overview
The significant impact of Arkansas’ agricultural industry on the state’s economy and nation’s food
supply is well-established. Arkansas’ largest industry generates over 235,000 jobs and contributes
$20.9 billion annually to the state economy. Arkansas produces over half of the nation’s rice and
ranks in the top 24 among states for production of 15 top agricultural commodities. 1 Arkansas
Department of Agriculture (ADA) supports the competitiveness of this industry and safety of its
products. 2 Formed in 2005 through the consolidation of multiple independent commissions, ADA
houses five primary divisions including: 1) Forestry, 2) Plant Industries, 3) Natural Resources, 4)
Poultry and Livestock, and 5) Shared Services.
Through the Arkansas Forward project, a 2024 initiative to improve the efficiency and effectiveness
of Arkansas’ 15 cabinet-level departments, ADA prioritized implementation of four initiatives
including realigning its organization structure to improve efficiency, increasing availability of data to
drive decision-making, increasing digitization and improving efficiency of its business processes
thereby reducing citizen impact, and prioritizing its technology roadmap to ensure ongoing
innovation.
This Strategic Management Plan (“Plan”) memorializes the work completed by ADA during Arkansas
Forward, translating the department’s vision into a plan consisting of recommended organizational
structure, key initiatives prioritized for immediate implementation, and related performance
metrics. A companion project plan (“Work Plan”) provides a more detailed resource to support
implementation of the initiatives by ADA’s Arkansas Forward project management team.
The mission of the Arkansas Department of Agriculture is encapsulated in its commitment to
leadership and effective program implementation: “The Arkansas Department of Agriculture is
dedicated to the development and implementation of policies and programs for Arkansas
agriculture, forestry, and natural resources to keep its farmers and ranchers competitive in national
and international markets while conserving natural resources and ensuring safe food, fiber, and
forest products for the citizens of the state and nation”
Recommended Organizational Structure
ADA’s current functional organization structure is shown in Figure 1.
1
Arkansas Department of Agriculture, 2023 Annual Report, http://www.agriculture.arkansas.gov/wp-
content/uploads/ADA-Annual-Report-2023.pdf.
2
Arkansas Department of Agriculture, 2023 Annual Report.
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 1
Figure 1 – Current and Recommended Functional Organizational Structure
As part of Arkansas Forward, ADA’s structure was reviewed to identify opportunities for redesign in
three areas:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission;
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives; and,
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions (i.e.,
information technology, human resources, procurement).
Recommendations based on department interviews and data analysis include:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission: ADA identified
an opportunity to restructure the Laboratory Services Team (within the Shared Services
division) to support collaboration and improve the cohesiveness of the team by streamlining
the managerial spans of control and layers.
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives: No staffing
changes are anticipated as a result of or in order to implement the ADA Arkansas Forward
initiatives.
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions:
Based on direction from the Steering Committee, Transformation and Shared Services (TSS)
will assume responsibility for the Payroll and Help Desk functions statewide, as the first
Human Resources and Information Technology functions to transfer to TSS in a statewide
shared services model. Additional decisions on sequencing of further functions have not yet
been determined.
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 2
These department-specific changes impact one division reporting to the Deputy Secretary of
Agriculture but do not impact the high-level view of the organization chart. The recommended
organization structure continues to be that shown in Figure 1, however under the Laboratory
Services division, the proposed structure is to reorganize from one director with 14 direct reports to
a new structure with five direct reports, as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2 – Recommended Organizational Structure – Laboratory Services Team
Meeting the Vision of an Effective and Efficient Future Department:
ADA is committed to the identification and resolution of organizational inefficiencies. As part of
Arkansas Forward, ADA identified changes for its Laboratory Services division. At this time, the
department is confident in its ability to restructure this team to execute this change. However to
achieve its vision fully, ADA requires the support of OPM to lead changes to the Arkansas’s personnel
structures to create senior individual contributor roles, which the state does not have today.
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation
ADA leadership generated approximately 15 ideas to improve the departmental effectiveness and
efficiency, before prioritizing four initiatives:
• AG-0 - Take action on manager roles and team size to target appropriate spans of control for
function and management archetype to more effectively deliver on the departmental
mission.
• AG-6 - Implement a dashboard that displays managerial and program metrics to support
outcomes-based tracking (e.g., funds, spend, fleet, real estate, licenses issued, and other
performance metrics for the Department of Agriculture).
• AG-7 - Identify "big rock" processes by frequency and labor intensiveness to digitize, then
digitize those processes that are currently burdensome for department employees and/or
citizens to complete manually.
• AG-18 - Build a future roadmap for Operational Excellence initiatives (AG-4, AG-8, AG-9, AG-
10, AG-11, AG-15, AG-16), including detailed resource needs and action steps to facilitate a
2-year transformation.
The Arkansas Department of Agriculture is dedicated to advancing the Arkansas Forward initiatives
by optimizing managerial roles and team sizes (AG-0), and leveraging technology to improve
business processes and improve citizen experience (AG-6, AG-7, and AG-18).
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 3
Initiative ADA#0 - Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and
efficiency
This initiative is a primary component of a core Arkansas Forward priority: for each cabinet-level
department to build an agile organization. It includes implementation of a tailored and modernized
organization to ensure effective distribution of management responsibilities, enhanced operational
efficiency, and improved role clarity among managerial positions.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Laboratory Services Section is a critical shared
service, consisting of the following Laboratories:
• Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory (main laboratory in Little Rock and branch laboratory in
Fayetteville)
• Chemistry Laboratory
• Seed Laboratory
• Petroleum Laboratory
• Metrology Laboratory
Testing and analysis activities performed timely and accurately by the Laboratory are crucial to
ADA’s quality assurance and compliance programs and to ensure ADA and the stakeholders it
represents comply with various state and federal regulatory and statutory requirements.
Based on analysis of the organization’s current structure and team size, opportunities for
improvement were identified within the Laboratory Services function, including:
• Some Agriculture program managers are managing an uneven number of reports, despite
identical roles;
• Many microbiologist supervisors may be managing too few reports because there is no
career ladder to senior technical roles; and,
• There are some instances in which multiple layers of management only have one direct
report, which may also be indicative of a lack of career ladders.
Rationale: The current organization’s structure and lack of career ladders for certain technical
roles may contribute to a loss of talent over time. Creating opportunities to reward technical
expertise through a non-managerial career ladder may allow the department to retain this talent,
while preventing creation of multiple small teams which may prevent the department from realizing
efficiencies that would come from collaboration of these staff on a single team. There could be
confusion and dissatisfaction among managers with uneven team size/workload and for employees
who may not understand the organization structure or may lack role clarity. Addressing some of
these organizational issues could yield improvement in employee satisfaction.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – ADA Work Plan provides the action steps in the
recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with ADA staff and review
of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 4
• Transitioning existing staff into a career ladder that recognizes and rewards technical
expertise and ensuring no loss of income is important in maintaining staff buy-in for this
reorganization and preventing unwanted attrition.
• Communicating clearly to the broader ADA organization about the purpose of these changes
will support the reorganization.
Recommended steps to implement changes to Laboratory Services division:
• Recommended changes to the Laboratory Services division are to create five teams reporting
to the Laboratory Director, which creates comparable team sizes and eliminates the
occurrence of multiple small teams.
• The direct reports to the Director include:
o Chief of Quality – Oversees quality management at the Little Rock and Fayetteville Labs.
o Safety and Operations manager – Oversees safety, inventory, customer complaints,
regulatory compliance, and the procurement process. Oversees chemistry, residue
analysis, and the seed laboratories.
o Technical Leader – Manages Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) and High-path Avian
Influenza (HPAI) testing programs and multiple other projects across the Veterinary
Diagnostic Laboratories. Oversees veterinary diagnostic labs e.g., Virology, Serology,
Clinical Pathology, Bacteriology, and the Receiving sections.
o Aquaculture program manager – Oversees Fish Health Inspection Program, which
serves fish farms both in-state and out-of-state.
o Chief Veterinarian – Oversees pathology and histology programs, working closely with
ASU and Lyon colleges.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: The proposed organization
chart for the Laboratory Services division is provided above in Figure 2. Realignment of the
Laboratory Services Sections into these areas supports efficient decision-making by decreasing the
direct reports to the Laboratory Director, groups similarly functioned staff into teams which fosters
collaboration, and may allow for a better focus on the customer divisions it supports. Improving the
effectiveness and efficiency of the Laboratory Services Section supports nearly all other divisions in
performing their responsibilities.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
Consolidation into five functional teams reporting through the Director could generate process
improvements and changes in the standard operating procedures to the extent that staff can identify
best practices in use by some of the teams today and replicate them across the entire team. It is
recommended that once each new team forms, the manager conduct a review of the SOP to
incorporate best practices or efficiencies identified.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: Proposed metrics to
assess the impact of this initiative include:
• Managerial Span of Control: Measure the average number of direct reports per manager and
track the percentage increase or decrease over time.
• Management Layers: Count the total number of hierarchical layers between the Secretary of
Agriculture and front-line employees and track the reduction in layers.
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 5
• Employee Satisfaction: Conduct employee surveys to measure satisfaction scores related
to management support and role clarity, tracking the average score improvement over time.
In addition to these measures, surveys could be utilized for impacted staff during the transition to
identify and address any issues or concerns.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: This change is expected to have a fiscally neutral impact (positions would be
converted from managerial roles into contributing roles but at a comparable pay grade). This would
require OPM-led changes to Arkansas’s personnel structures to create senior individual contributor
roles, which the state does not have today.
Change Management Plan: Clear communication with staff about the purpose for the changes
should accompany any information on the new process changes. Recommended messaging and
modalities are included for each audience in Figure 3. Key activities and timing for communication
plan are included in Appendix A – ADA Work Plan.
Figure 3 – ADA-0 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Staff impacted by • These changes are to • Town hall. • Alex Johnston Deputy
changes strengthen our team, support • Face-to-Face Director Shared
collaboration, and enable more team Services
efficient decision-making. meetings with • Corey Seats, General
• The department will now offer leadership, Counsel and Arkansas
additional career paths to future Forward PM
recognize, reward, and retain manager, and
top talent. Promotion into a former
management role will not be manager.
the only path to promotion.
• Detailed description of
changes, including specific
changes for every team
impacted by the reorganization:
new manager is [insert]; former
manager is moving to [role].
Everyone continues to have a
place on the team.
Other ADA staff • These changes are to • Town hall. • Alex Johnston, Deputy
strengthen our team, support • All staff Director Shared
collaboration, and enable more email. Services
efficient decision-making. • Laboratory Services
• High level summary of Director
changes. • Corey Seats, General
Counsel and Arkansas
Forward PM
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 6
Initiative ADA #6 - Develop dashboard for key programmatic metrics
This initiative recommends that ADA develop a dashboard by December 2024 for each ADA division
that displays key performance indicators and metrics related to program activities in real-time.
Examples of programmatic metrics include: 1) number of inspections completed; 2) licenses issued;
3) violations issued; and 4) lab tests performed. The goal of the dashboard is to enhance
transparency, accountability, and effectiveness within the Department of Agriculture and its
intended use is for both internal and external stakeholders.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Departmental leadership identified creation of internal
and external dashboards as the highest priorities for the ADA’s technology roadmap. Under the
leadership of the Information Technology Team, the first generation of internal management
dashboards has been deployed for Plant Industries and is in process for the Poultry and Livestock
and Natural Resources divisions. The department is building these dashboards with existing IT
resources and deploying them through a web-based application. Implementation is planned in
phases; each department is establishing an initial dashboard with available data. Staff manually
collect and input metrics. Staff receive training on how to add additional metrics. The second phase
of the project will be to automate dashboard production to reduce recurring staff data collection and
reporting time. In the third phase, division leaders will receive training in data visualization tools. It is
anticipated that as the department’s data acumen increases, leaders will adjust the metrics on their
internal dashboards, focusing the number of measures and identifying gaps in data not captured.
There are no public-facing dashboards today. However, after deployment of the internal
dashboards, a future phase of this project is to consult division leadership about the data to be
shared externally. In the interim, ADA is committed to transparency and accountability for the
functions it performs. Each division at ADA captures core performance data, many data points of
which are published in its thorough annual report. Examples of the metrics published (samples
provided for each division for illustrative purposes) include:
• Forestry: number (#) wildfires suppressed, # training sessions delivered, # data collections,
# primitive campsites repaired
• Plant Industries: # samples collected, # inspections completed (storage tanks, retail
locations), # laboratory tests performed
• Natural Resources: dollar value ($) of funds distributed, # plans written by nutrient
management planners
• Poultry and Livestock: # approved shipping forms, # inspections completed, pounds of
graded and certified chicken products, # audits completed
• Shared Services: Laboratory Services - # tests completed (for significant number of events);
# certifications of large and small mass standards
Rationale: Building internal and external dashboards will allow ADA to mature as a data-driven
organization and help the department to realize a number of advantages compared to current
reporting including:
• Focusing the number of measures reported to clarify to the most significant activities
performed;
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 7
• Expanding the types of measures included from “outputs” (describing the number of
processes and activities or activities completed) to more “outcome” and “efficiency”
measures which show the results of ADA’s work and the effectiveness of its business
processes;
• Driving performance improvement by identifying goals/targets for each measure to establish
when the department meets its goals;
• Providing trending data to provide context to the user and assess the impact of policy and
program changes or new initiatives; and,
• Providing real-time data to inform management decisions and monitor the department’s
progress in reaching the stated goals.
Other state and federal agricultural agencies are taking steps to make more data available to internal
staff and the public (activities summarized in Figure 4). Development of automated dashboards with
the most important key performance indicators supports accurate and timely decision-making;
prevention, earlier detection and remediation of performance issues; and reduces errors and
employee time spent producing reports. The value of these reports to the public is in immediate
access to useful, capacity-enhancing information.
Figure 4 – Examples of Dashboards Used by State and Federal Agricultural Agencies
State/ Intended Description
Entity Audience
US Internal In 2018, USDA deployed enterprise administrative dashboards ("CXO
Department Dashboard") that provide leadership with insight into human resources,
of Agriculture information technology, finance, property, procurement, security, and
(USDA) operations. USDA implemented these dashboards using 10-week sprints,
and in the second year, refined them to improve data quality, usability, and
completeness by adding additional metrics.
USDA management used the available data to constantly monitor
performance which drive efficiency, responsiveness, and improved
customer service. Creation of the dashboards helped USDA:
1) Become a more data-driven organization
2) Improve performance and reduce operating costs
3) Increase the speed of decision-making
Resource: https://www.usda.gov/media/blog/2018/08/02/usda-becoming-
more-data-driven-customer-focused-organization
USDA External In April 2024, USDA created the farmers.gov dashboard to provide state-level
farmer-focused data sets and resources from USDA and other government
agencies. Data include a standard state profile, commodity prices, current
weather data, past climate and storm data, and relevant state contacts.
Resource:
https://www.farmers.gov/blog/farmersgov-local-dashboard-is-now-
available-all-50-states
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 8
State/ Intended Description
Entity Audience
Iowa External The Iowa State University has created a series of dashboards on the Iowa
Nutrient Reduction Strategy and waste water quality improvement. One in
particular shows Tracking Permits Issued to Wastewater and Industrial
Facilities. These dashboards offer an example of how data on licensing and
permitting data can be shared.
Resource: https://nrstracking.cals.iastate.edu/tracking-iowa-nutrient-
reduction-strategy
Colorado External As part of the Governor’s Dashboard, the goals and performance of each
department are provided each fiscal year. Color coding illustrates whether
the department’s performance meets or has not yet met each goal.
Interactive charts allow the user to expand on each goal to see the major
initiatives to improve performance in that goal. For Agriculture in the current
2023-2024 fiscal year, the goals include:
• Advancing local food access: Increase small food retailers' purchasing
and farmers' distribution capacity of healthy food in low-income, low-
access communities by $1 million by June 30, 2024.
• Supporting the next generation: Reduce barriers young people face in
building a career in agriculture by providing training, education, and
financial opportunities to 1500 of the next generation of agricultural
leaders and producers by June 30, 2024.
• Expanding water-resilient agriculture: Through technical assistance,
grant funding, marketing assistance, advocacy, and partnerships, CDA
will assist 1,000 producers and water conservation leaders incorporate
effective water resilience practices to maintain robust agricultural
production by June 30, 2024.
• Advancing animal health and welfare: Provide education and outreach
to 3500 veterinarians, animal owners, and stakeholders to advance
animal health and welfare by June 30, 2024.
Resource:
https://dashboard.colorado.gov/governors-dashboard/agriculture
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – ADA Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with ADA staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
ADA has a thoughtful, phased approach to implementation of its dashboards. Based on an
assessment of ADA capabilities, staff interviews, and the experience of other state and the USDA in
developing their dashboards, the following strategies were identified in response to likely risks:
• To fully realize the operational benefits of becoming a more data-driven organization,
building data analytics acumen is an important enabling practice. Having staff with the
experience to support leadership in establishing performance expectations tied to the
metrics, modeling behaviors for use of the dashboards, and establishing accountability for
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 9
performance of the metrics is important. This includes assigning owners to each metric,
setting a goal/standard for each metric based on statute/industry best practice/historical
performance, reviewing dashboards regularly in meetings and requiring owners of areas with
under- performance to develop and execute remediation plans.
• There is an opportunity for the divisions to continue to refine the data shown on the
dashboards after initial launch, especially the external dashboards. Initial data available
may not be the best data to use in managing the programs and for informing stakeholders.
ADA has indicated plans to use an iterative approach to implementation and to revisit the
metrics after initial implementation. It is recommended that the organization and
management commit to the multi-year journey required to develop and refine its
dashboards. There may be a need to shift many of the metrics reported on externally from
“output” measures that measure activities such as licenses issued, investigations
performed, and dollars distributed to measures such as:
o Efficiency: This measure type captures the effectiveness and efficiency of internal
processes. Examples include average time to complete an activity (i.e., process a
license, complete an investigation, process a lab sample) or average cost per key
activity. This type of metric is applicable to any core task with a statutory timeline, where
is focused on meeting a specific timeframe, as well as any area where the department
wants to establish additional transparency or thinks there is an opportunity to achieve
improvement through regular review of data.
o Outcome: Outcome measures focus on the results of ADA’s processes for stakeholders
including industry stakeholders and Arkansans and may be longer-term. Examples
include the dollar amount of restitution to land owners (such as through Law
Enforcement Unit), the number of wildfires suppressed, and incidence of disease
outbreaks.
Appendix B provides a worksheet that may be used by staff in identifying and defining
additional metrics.
Recommended steps for establishing internal and external dashboards (future state):
• A core project team with IT and programmatic leadership should be formed to support the
project’s implementation.
• Division and IT leadership should continue work to identify the initial group of metrics for the
internal division dashboards (completing implementation with Forestry and Shared
Services).
• The ADA IT team should execute its project plan for implementation of the initial dashboards.
• Following completion of this phase, the IT team should:
o Meet with each division to evaluate how their dashboard is working and identify
opportunities for improvement such as: 1) missing metrics that may need to be
incorporated; 2) measures that can be removed due to low utility; and 3) discussion
about evolution of measures to include more efficiency and outcome measures.
o Complete automation of the dashboards to the extent possible. Note that without
digitizing certain processes, automation may not be possible.
o Begin Phase II to deploy external-facing dashboards.
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 10
• The division leadership, aided by IT leadership, should establish performance expectations
tied to the metrics (e.g., establish an owner for the metric, establish a goal based on
statute/industry best practice/or historical performance).
• The core project team should develop an external communication plan (press release, user
guide and frequently asked questions for the website, and stakeholder emails) prior to the
release of any external-facing dashboards.
• The core project team should develop an internal training plan for managers on how to use
the dashboards. This should include ongoing professional development opportunities on
use of data analytics to drive process improvement and sharing of internal best practices.
• The core project team should complete a return on investment analysis following completion
of the project (this could be phased to assess the internal and external dashboards).
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Based on interviews with
ADA leadership, ADA has the staffing and resources to support this initiative including within the
divisions and among its technical staff. Existing resources in each division support data collection
and reporting today and this initiative is expected to result in use of automated dashboards, reducing
time spent on data collection and preparation of manual reports.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Based on ADA’s initial sizing of costs
of implementing a new dashboard, they expected that it can be done within existing appropriations.
Further, ADA can implement this dashboard in a phased-approach, to further reduce costs (i.e., start
with simple Excel-based monthly report with no data visualization). There are no staffing costs
expected as a result of this initiative.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: The
most significant anticipated process change is that the dashboards will support ADA becoming a
more data-driven organization. In order for the dashboards to have the intended impact of supporting
each division in setting performance goals and holding business units accountable for performance,
integrating the use of the dashboards into decision-making will take time and require modeling from
ADA’s leadership team. Some of the ways to support this change include to regularly incorporate
review of the dashboard on department, division, and team meetings; on a monthly basis, require
metric owners with performance below the goal to provide a remediation plan; hold lunch and learns
to allow peers to share best practices in how they are using the dashboard to identify and address
problems in their business units; and provide tip sheets on how managers can integrate review of
the dashboard into their own team meetings.
Another set of process changes may occur due to the lack of data availability. ADA may not currently
capture all data it wishes to include in its internal or external dashboards. For example, a division
may wish to set standards to complete certain transactional tasks within a given timeframe but the
current process may not involve tracking key dates or times for every step in the process. If the
division wishes to include these measures, it will have to adjust the current business process to
capture and store this data for reporting purposes.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The success of this
initiative will be measured by the existence of an internal and external dashboard (by division) and
evidence of the dashboard’s use by the management team. Metrics to track this include:
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 11
• Dashboard utilization (e.g., unique weekly views)
• Post-development survey of dashboard user satisfaction
• #/% of managerial meetings into which regular dashboard review to support decision
processes is incorporated
These metrics are new to the organization to capture and would require definition, documentation
of the data source/methodology, and establishment of a baseline.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: Based on ADA’s analysis, ADA-6 is expected to have a fiscally neutral impact. In the
short term, staff will be collecting and reporting on the dashboard metrics manually. When the
dashboard is automated, this will result in freed-up time for staff otherwise responsible for data
collection and reporting, which can be reinvested into other areas of responsibility. Operational
savings from performance improvement could be realized in the future.
Change Management Plan: Recommended messaging and modalities are included for each
audience in Figure 5. Key activities and timing for communication plan are included in Appendix A –
ADA Work Plan.
Figure 5 – ADA-6 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
External stakeholders • ADA is developing an exciting • Press • Jeffrey Powell
dashboard to share data with release
farmers, stakeholders, and the • Website
public. update
• The dashboards will help ADA • Emails
become a more data-driven distributed
organization and drive a culture via existing
of improvement. stakeholder
• Process overview of the lists
categories of metrics available,
how the metrics were chosen
and how ADA developed the
dashboards.
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 12
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
ADA management • ADA is developing internal • Townhall • Secretary Wes Ward
staff dashboards to help the meetings. • Division leaders
department before more data • Management • Jeffrey Powell
driven. staff emails.
• These tools are meant to help
managers have access to real-
time information about their
staff’s performance.
• Resources will be provided to
support their adoption of this
tool including training, lunch
and learns, and FAQs.
• Explain the categories of
metrics available, how the
metrics were chosen, and how
ADA developed the dashboards.
• Ask for their support in
monitoring the impact of the
dashboards and identifying
areas for improvement in future
iterations.
All ADA staff • ADA is developing internal • Staff • Managers relay
dashboards to help the meetings. information to their
department before more data- • All staff teams.
driven and transparent to the emails. • All staff emails
public. reinforce messages.
• Explain the categories of
metrics available, how the
metrics were chosen, and how
ADA developed the
dashboards.
Initiative ADA #7 - Digitize and automate manual paperwork filled out by both
employees and citizens
The intent of this initiative is to reduce labor hours spent on low value-added work by digitizing
paperwork that is burdensome and time consuming for department employees or citizens to
complete today (e.g., contracts, purchase requisitions).
Initiative Overview and Current State: While ADA has been committed to advancing use of
technology to improve services and operations, adoption of digitization has varied by division and
there are many opportunities to enhance the experience of stakeholders and staff.
Lack of digitization for processes impacting citizens: ADA maintains multiple external-facing
business processes that are paper-based. While not exhaustive, the following examples are
illustrative of the nature of ADA’s non-digitized processes across divisions:
• Licensing (with renewal letters sent by mail and returned by mail)
• Permitting
• Invoicing/accounts payable
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 13
• Inspections
Many of these processes are paper-based and manual, requiring the external stakeholder to print
and mail a form (or wait to receive a form in the mail and return it), often with payment to the
department and requiring ADA staff to complete a number of manual steps to complete the process
using a non-automated workflow. ADA does not yet have an Enterprise Content Management (ECM)
system to meet the needs of its business.
ADA has invested in digitization in certain areas to benefit its stakeholders by making many forms
available electronically (for some departments over half of forms are available online) and deploying
online pay functionality (examples shown in Figure 6). However, the full extent of ADA’s paper-based
forms and processes have not been identified; development of a comprehensive inventory of all
forms, noting whether the form is available electronically or on paper, is in process.
Figure 6 – Examples of Current Online Pay Functionality on ADA Website
Division Program
Arkansas Livestock and Laboratory Program-testing services
Poultry (ALPD) Poultry and Egg Program- Egg Handler Permit Fees, Egg Inspection Fees,
and/or Egg Grading Fees
ALPD License and Registration
ALPD Tag Order Payments
Plant Industries Pesticide Section Application
Laboratory Services Veterinary Diagnostic Lab
Other • DP-21 Application for Registration of Pesticides (For Use with Online
Payment Only)
• DP-23 Restricted Use Pesticide Dealer's License (For Use with Online
Payment Only)
• DP-25 Private Applicator License (For Use with Online Payment Only)
• DP-26A Private Applicator Pilot’s Auth. & Category Certification (For Use
with Online Payment Only)
• DP-27 Non-Commercial License (For Use with Online Payment Only)
• DP-28 Commercial Applicator Technician License (For Use with Online
Payment Only)
• DP-29 Firms Commercial Applicator License (For Use with Online Payment
Only)
• DP-29A Additional Equipment Application (For Use with Online Payment
Only)
• DP-30 Individual Commercial Applicator License (For Use with Online
Payment Only)
• DP-32 Firms Custom Applicator Permit (For Use with Online Payment
Only)
• DP-35 Firms Tree Injector Applicator Permit (For Use with Online Payment
Only)
• DP-38A Additional Category or Custom Pilot Auth. Appl. For Individual
Commercial
• Non-Commercial Applicator License (For Use with Online Payment Only)
• DP-42 Bulk Dealer Permit (For Use with Online Payment Only)
• DP-61 Application For 2,4-D Hardship Permit, including DP-62 Field Id
Form
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 14
Source: Arkansas Department of Agriculture website.
ADA has ongoing digitization projects in some divisions, which have been scoped within existing
appropriations. For example, a contractor is building a new application for Plant Industries to convert
its multiple applications and is tackling some of its forms. The department is also exploring
electronic document storage solutions. Larger digitization projects such as implementation of an
EDM system may require an appropriation. ADA has also implemented use of tablets for staff
working in the field (such as to complete inspections) but the utility of these tools is limited by the
lack of digitized work flows.
Some of the factors contributing to the current paper-based and manual processes include:
• Statutory requirements for signature or hard copy document storage;
• Certain divisions with legacy processes (from prior to the consolidation in 2005);
• Resistance of customers to automation, lack of email addresses, or religious objection to
technology;
• Lack of access to broadband internet;
• Lack of staffing to champion this effort; and,
• Lack of funding to support digitization.
These can create a sub-optimal experience for the external stakeholders ADA serves due to:
• Potential for human error (i.e., possible when data from forms are inputted manually for
processing);
• Process delays (i.e., when renewal forms must be mailed and returned for processing); and,
• Duplication of effort (i.e., separate applications and site visits for farmers who may require
licenses across multiple ADA divisions).
Lack of digitization also impacts ADA staff, in multiple ways:
• Time and effort spent performing rote tasks to complete manual processes;
• Significant time expended completing reports following site visits; and,
• Lack of business intelligence on the status of work and KPIs around processing time
Lack of digitization for processes impacting employees: ADA has digitized certain high volume
tools for staff such as the IT ticketing system and travel request form. There are opportunities for
continued improvement, such as the digitization of the travel reimbursement process, which today
requires capture of a wet signature. Another opportunity is to enable the Forestry Division to use the
state’s time sheet system while accounting for the unique cost allocation needs of the division.
Today, administrative staff manually enter timesheet information on behalf of the division’s
employees, which creates the opportunity for error.
Rationale: ADA-7 recommends that ADA move forward with digitization to reduce staff labor
performed for manual processes and to improve the citizen experience. Additional benefits ADA
staff brainstormed some of the greatest potential benefits from increased digitization:
• Increased Efficiency: Digital workflows streamline processes, reducing the time needed to
locate, share, and process documents.
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 15
• Enhanced Accessibility: Digital documents can be accessed remotely and simultaneously
by multiple users, improving collaboration and service delivery.
• Improved Customer Service: Faster processing and easier access to information enable
state agencies to provide quicker and more efficient services to citizens.
• Cost Savings: Reducing or eliminating paper use cuts costs related to printing, storage, and
document management.
• Better Data Security: Digital records can be encrypted and secured with advanced access
controls, reducing the risk of loss, theft, or unauthorized access.
• Integration of Permitting and Inspections: Digitization makes it easier to align permitting and
inspection schedules to minimize disruption to external customers
• Improved Accuracy: Automated data entry and processing reduce human errors associated
with manual paperwork.
• Simplified Compliance: Digital records are easier to track and audit, helping agencies
comply with regulatory requirements and maintain proper documentation.
In addition, staff identified potential functionality for consideration as part of a digitization project:
• Digitize documents
• Enable text-based communications
• Create one stop shop for customers
• Establish unique identifier can be created to allow for tracking of status, and see all relevant
licenses/renewals and timelines
• Compile list of cross-over farms (where multiple divisions may be completing inspections)
and “stack” inspections
• Coordinate inspections to route the next available inspector
• Ability to establish standard timeframes for renewals and inspections
• Customer service solutions such as call center solution and chat bot
• Automation through website
While ADA has multiple processes which can be digitized, the following figures provide an illustrative
example of how digitization can be beneficial using the inspection process (used in a variety of
situations including investigating complaints, pesticide usage, pest control applicators, etc.). Figure
7 demonstrates the current state of a general inspection process. Figure 8 illustrates how that
process can be altered and enhanced using technology (with the process steps enhanced with
digitalization noted in orange).
Figure 7 – General Inspection Current State Process Map
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 16
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 17
Figure 8 – General Inspection Future State Map
ADA is utilizing a division-by-division review to identify opportunities from digitization. While ADA
would realize significant benefits from digitizing its current processes alone, a best practice is to
conduct solutioning sessions with the impacted staff on how the process could be improved and
streamlined using technology, as opposed to focusing solely on digitizing the existing process.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – ADA Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with ADA staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success: Creation of an interference diagram
with department staff (shown in Figure 9) provided an opportunity to identify multiple potential risks
and barriers to success. An interference diagram is a pictorial representation of the barriers
identified by staff (shown in red) in realizing the goal of digitization (shown in blue). The staff also
identified strategies to overcome potential risks and enable success (shown in green), including:
• Developing incentives and clearly articulating the benefits of the new digitized tools for ADA’s
customers is important for adoption. Other Arkansas departments such as the Department
of Finance and Administration have deployed self-service functionality to mirror functions
that are performed in DMV offices. Over time, DFA has converted a significant share of its
customers to digital self-servers.
• Maintaining non-digital options for stakeholders who will not adopt digital tools (religious
beliefs, apprehension, lack of broadband connectivity) will be needed in parallel to the new
digital tools.
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 18
• ADA should identify all the rule/statutory requirements for hard copy and wet signature and
work with the legislature to address some of these requirements so that long-term, more
business processes can be digitized.
• There is a need for ADA program and IT leadership to meet with Department of
Transformation and Shared Services (TSS) staff to understand the potential for ADA
digitization initiatives to overlap TSS’ cross-departmental Data Warehouse and Government
Services Portal initiatives. In particular, the Government Services Portal initiative seeks to
enhance citizen interactions with government and minimize costs and duplication as
departments digitize. The intent of this coordination is not to preclude ADA from taking action
to digitize now, but to ensure that acting but to ensure that digitization is accomplished in a
manner that can be integrated into the Government Services Portal project in the long-term.
Figure 9 – ADA-7 Interference Diagram
Recommended steps for expanding use of digitization (future state):
Based on the anticipated challenges staff identified in the interference diagram, a step-by-step
sequencing approach for expanding digitization includes:
1. System Development and Implementation:
• Review existing business process, use process mapping to document the “as is” process.
• Identify opportunities for process improvement through digitization and prioritize
enhancements (if required based on available resources).
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 19
• Collect requirements in collaboration between IT and program leaders; prioritize creation of
user-friendly features for the customer’s benefit.
o Identify a documentation solution that supports easy generation of paper
documents. This system should be intuitive and adaptable to the department's
specific needs.
• Prioritize system security: Invest in robust security software to safeguard sensitive
information. Consider implementing multi-layered protection with both primary and
secondary software solutions.
• Assess whether to build or procure for the system.
2. Multi-Language Options:
• Explore and implement multi-language options: Research and incorporate multi-language
capabilities into customer-facing documentation. This will improve accessibility and
inclusivity for diverse audiences.
3. Process Optimization and Standardization:
• Streamline the reservation process: Develop clear procedures for the reservation process
and share them with new staff. This ensures consistency and efficiency.
• Leverage existing tools: Utilize Outlook for reservations and consider using PowerApps for
reservations and communication. This can streamline workflows and reduce manual effort.
4. Data Management and Accessibility:
• Centralize data storage: Implement a system to store and manage data in a central location.
This will facilitate easy access and retrieval of information.
• Enhance data usability: Convert data into a printable PDF format with the TR1 layout and link
to currency converter data. This makes information readily accessible and user-friendly.
5. Staff Training and Support:
• Dedicate staff to digital transformation: Allocate resources for staff training and support in
digital transformation initiatives. This ensures a smooth transition and ongoing success.
• Review and update rules and laws: Conduct a thorough review of existing rules and laws to
identify areas that need to be updated or aligned with digital processes. Collaborate with the
Governor's Office (GO) and Legislature to address any necessary changes.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Digitization will allow staff
resources to refocus on mission critical work, shifting time from data entry and other rote tasks that
compensate for the manual processes.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: The costs of digitization have not
been determined. It is anticipated that some projects may be addressed through ADA’s existing
budget, but large projects may require ADA to obtain an appropriation. ADA has sufficient staff
resources for this project. ADA should consider the costs of implementation in context of the
Government Services Portal initiative
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 20
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: It is
anticipated that process changes will occur across all of the divisions that implement digitization.
For example, if a paper-based form is digitized and the accompanying work flow is digitized, the
customer experience would change, as would the manner in which staff process the task. It is
assumed that while paper form options will likely remain for users who prefer not to adopt digital
solutions, ADA would modify its business process to convert paper forms to digital forms so that it
could process all forms received using the same digitized workflow.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The success of this
initiative can be measured through metrics such as:
• Reduction in Low-Value Added Work: Reduction in low-value-added work and data entry
errors
• Decreased time dedicated to processing mail-based forms; Reduced total time processing
forms
• Increased employee satisfaction scores through additional survey pulse points
• Increased customer satisfaction scores through additional survey pulse points
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: Based on ADA’s initial analysis and re-evaluation, ADA-7 has the potential positive
annual reoccurring financial impact of up to $385,000, which includes cost savings and cost
avoidance opportunities that could be captured in the future. If this value is captured, it 1) may
address an already agreed upon budget target, 2) may be reinvested, and/or 3) may be harvested in
a budget reduction. This initiative could begin implementation immediately, with benefit being
captured in 6 months, and according to staff, completion of this data initiative occurring in 2026.
Change Management Plan: Key activities and timing for communication plan are included in
Appendix A – Work Plan. Key messages for each group of impacted stakeholders are shown in
Figure 10.
Figure 10 – ADA-7 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
External stakeholders • ADA is investing in digitization • Press release • Alex Johnston
to improve customer • Website content • Jeffery Powell
experience. • Announcements
• Summary of new features and for stakeholder
how to access them. emails
• Use of these tools is beneficial
in many ways, such as
reducing the time to process
and improving self-service.
Internal staff • ADA is investing in digitization • All staff town • Alex Johnston
to improve customer halls • Jeffery Powell
experience and its ability to • All staff
deliver on its mission. meetings
• These investments will also • All staff emails
benefit staff, freeing up time
spent on data entry and
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 21
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
compensating for manual
processes, to devote to other
critical functions.
• Summary of new features and
how to access them.
Initiative ADA #18 - Develop technology roadmap for future of ADA
This initiative recommends that ADA develop a two-year technology roadmap for the future of ADA
which includes, a prioritization of multiple initiatives identified through Arkansas forward, including
internal dashboards, digitization of high impact processes, and approximately seven other
initiatives. The critical deliverables of this initiative are:
1. A detailed two-year implementation plan with action steps to incorporate the top 7-10 IT
projects defined by ADA leaders
2. A robust business case with estimates of resources required to accomplish the two-year
plan, and the resulting cost efficiencies/ benefits
3. A plan to obtain approval for additional FTEs, contract labor, or borrowed FTEs from other
departments as necessary to accomplish roadmap
4. Owners clearly defined for each action step
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADA’s IT Department includes a leader and seven
development resources. The department balances projects using existing resources and
contractors as needed.
Rationale: Multiple, impactful IT projects have been identified for ADA, summarized in Figure 11.
Figure 11 – IT Projects Identified and Prioritized by ADA
Leadership
Initiative
Team Initiative name Initiative Description
#
Prioritization
Develop dashboard for
Department of Agriculture
1 AG-6 to have greater clarity into Internal dashboard
key managerial metrics
and performance
Develop dashboard for
Department of Agriculture
2 AG-6 to have greater clarity into External dashboard
key managerial metrics
and performance
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 22
Leadership
Initiative
Team Initiative name Initiative Description
#
Prioritization
Reduce labor hours spent on low value-added
Digitize Department
work by digitizing paperwork that is
paperwork for repetitive
3 AG-7 burdensome and time consuming for
and time-consuming
department employees or citizens to complete
operations
today (e.g., contracts, purchase requisitions)
Utilize predictive analytics to forecast service
Utilize predictive analytics
demand and dynamically adjust staffing levels
4 AG-8 for optimal service
and schedules to maintain optimal service
delivery
delivery without overburdening resources
Identify where ADA operates as a pass-through
Automate data transfer
entity for data submission and structure direct
5 AG-9 between local and federal
upload capability for local partners (e.g., EPA
partners
data from Plant Industries, grant pass-through)
Optimize citizen Map major citizen interactions across websites,
interactions including call centers, and in-person visits and use
Other priority AG-4
web, call center, and in- resulting data to improve
person effectiveness/efficiency of citizen interactions
Use marketing data to assess whether
Assess ROI of marketing
marketing spend that supports AR-produced
Other priority AG-10 spend using data
agricultural goods and services is effective and
analytics
in-line with private sector benchmarks
Review grant funds across the department to
determine whether they align with the goals of
the state, provide direction on what type of
Strengthen and
priorities grants should be supporting, and
standardize grant
Other priority AG-11 create standard processes and consider shared
management practices to
functions for grant monitoring to ensure
improv the ROI of grants
subgrantees are using grant funds as agreed to
reduce grant fraud and increase grant
compliance
Identify divisions and state programs (within
and outside ADA) that deploy services and
Streamline delivery of
Other priority AG-15 programming at the county level and streamline
county-level programming
delivery to improve citizen experience and
government efficiency
Identify opportunities to automate or simplify
Modernize state testing processes within state testing labs, and
Other priority AG-16
labs consider collaboration opportunities with labs
in other state government departments
The amount of identified IT needs exceeds the available capacity for the department. Development
of a plan to prioritize the IT roadmap for the next two years will allow ADA to manage expectations
for projects, identify resources, and request appropriations as needed.
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 23
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – ADA Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with ADA staff include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• As noted on ADA-7, there is a need for ADA to meet with TSS staff regarding its technology
roadmap to understand how projects may be related to statewide initiatives that are part of
TSS’ roadmap to prevent duplication and ensure coordination.
Recommended steps for establishing the technology roadmap include:
• Identifying the strategic objectives for the department as a result of Arkansas Forward and
guiding the department for the next two years.
• Prioritizing the list of identified projects.
• Gathering standard information for each project including high level requirements, a
timeline, and an estimate of return on investment (net of costs and cost savings). Complete
a high-level business case to identify resources needed.
• Identifying and prioritizing internal and external resources needed.
• Developing a detailed project plan.
• Obtaining internal approval.
• Obtaining external approval from Department of Transformation and Shared Services, as
applicable.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Creation of this plan is an
important step in ensuring the department’s IT projects are aligned to its strategic priorities and
efficient allocation of resources. Movement away from project-based approval to a strategic
roadmap would support decision-making.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: No staffing needs or costs are
anticipated to be incurred in the creation of the IT roadmap.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: No
process changes are required to develop the IT roadmap.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected impact of
this initiative is to improve planning and resource allocation and to ensure a planful, coordinated
approach to addressing ADA’s IT needs over the next several years. While return on investment
should be initially calculated and assessed following implementation of any project on the work
plan, their work plan should be considered an independent deliverable.
• Coordination and Approach Effectiveness: Number of coordinated IT projects completed on
time
• Planning and Resource Allocation Improvement: Percentage reduction in project planning
time
• Return on Investment: ROI percentage of projects implemented
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 24
• Work Plan Delivery: Percentage of work plan deliverables completed
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: There is no anticipated fiscal impact to prepare the technology roadmap. The
projects prioritized in the plan may require additional appropriations.
Change Management Plan: While individual technology projects (such as initiatives 6 and 7) will
have expected change management plans, the initiative to create a technology roadmap is not
expected to require its own communication plan.
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 25
Appendix B – Performance Measure Worksheet
1. Measure Name
2. Measure Definition (to include any calculation – numerator, denominator, and other steps
required to calculate such as to convert to a percent)
3. Measure type:
a. Output
b. Efficiency
c. Outcome
4. Data source:
a. System name
b. Relevant data fields
5. Is the measure readily available now?
a. Yes
b. No
c. If no, what business process changes are needed to capture the data and where can the
data be housed?
6. What is the goal (benchmark) to use in setting performance?
a. Is there a statutory requirement (As an example, if statute requires all investigations to
be completed within 30 days of identification, the goal would be 100% within 30 days)?
b. Is there an industry standard (As an example, if the average speed to answer in the call
center industry is 30 seconds, the goal could be 90% of calls answered within 30
seconds)?
c. If no requirement or industry standard, past performance data can be used to set a goal.
Performance for the last 3-5 years could be averaged and then an expectation of
improvement applied. For example, if the average number of days to complete an
investigation is 8 over the last 5 years and there is a desire to achieve improvement of
12%, a goal could be established to complete investigations within 7 days. The rate of
improvement should be set based on whether the department wishes to achieve realistic
improvement or to use a stretch goal. Past performance data provides context for what
rate of improvement to assume (i.e., if the average investigation length has been 8 days
for many years, shortening it by 20% to approx. 6.4 days may be too extreme in one year
without significant process changes. 5% improvement to 7.6 days may be too small)
7. What amount of history should be shown on the dashboard?
a. Year-to-date trend: Shows direction in recent months (can help to identify problems).
b. Year-over-year trends: Helps with resource alignment and analysis of system health, as
well as setting goals for year-over-year improvement.
c. Rolling-12 months: Helps to account for data with seasonality.
ADA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/9/2024 26
Strategic Management Plan:
Arkansas Department of Education
Overview
Arkansas Department of Education (ADE) provides leadership, support, and service to schools,
districts, and communities so every student graduates prepared for college, career, and community
engagement. With passage of the 2023 LEARNS Act (SB 294), ADE’s mission expanded to include
early childhood, making the department responsible for programs serving the public along the “birth
to career” continuum. ADE houses seven primary functions: 1) Elementary and Secondary
Education; 2) Career and Technical Education; 3) Higher Education; 4) Early Childhood; 5) the
Arkansas State Library; 6) the Arkansas Schools for the Deaf and Blind; and 7) the MLK Commission
and Board.
Through the Arkansas Forward project, a 2024 initiative to improve the efficiency and effectiveness
of Arkansas’ 15 cabinet-level departments, ADE prioritized areas to improve its organizational
structure to strengthen its ability to perform core roles and responsibilities, and prioritized
implementation of six initiatives, including three focused on strengthening its team, one on improving
stakeholder communication and engagement, and two designed to achieve operational cost savings.
This Strategic Management Plan (“Plan”) memorializes the work completed by ADE during Arkansas
Forward, translating the department’s vision into a plan consisting of recommended organizational
structure, key initiatives prioritized for immediate implementation, and related performance metrics.
A companion project plan (“Work Plan”) provides a more detailed resource to support
implementation of the initiatives by ADE’s Arkansas Forward project management team.
Recommended Organizational Structure
Over the last two years, ADE has experienced organizational changes due to passage of the LEARNS
Act in 2023 and transfer of early childhood functions and over 200 staff from the Department of
Human Services, among other factors. Secretary Oliva and the leadership team has prioritized
creation of a more efficient organization and seek to continue to align the organization’s structure
with the department’s core roles and responsibilities, governance, and performance measure goals.
The current organization structure shown in Figure 1.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Figure 1 – Current ADE Organizational Structure by Function
As part of Arkansas Forward, ADE’s structure was reviewed to identify opportunities for redesign in
three areas:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission;
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives; and,
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions (i.e.,
information technology, human resources, procurement).
Recommendations based on department interviews include:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission: The department
has identified some programmatic areas within its current scope that are not in alignment
with its other programs (e.g., the MLK Commission and State Library) as well as potential
redundancies with functions outside its scope (e.g., career and technical programs at ADE
that are not unlike programs operated by the Department of Commerce). Strategic
discussions are needed to ensure appropriate alignment of functions within and outside
ADE.
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives: Initiative
ADE-0 creates an opportunity to review the department’s management structure and
Initiative ADE-18 supports realignment of resources to mission critical needs. These items
are discussed in greater detail in the sections that follow.
In addition, there are three critical staffing areas where ADE seeks to use some of the cost
savings achieved through Arkansas Forward to reinvest in its team to better fulfill its mission.
ADE and TSS Office of Personnel Management should collaborate to identify solutions to
these challenges, including addressing position grading and funding through the statewide
Pay Plan. ADE would require upfront appropriation authority and funding for these needs,
including 1) key GS 8 and GS9 positions (where competition with school districts is difficult
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
to overcome), 2) specialized positions at the School for the Blind and Deaf (i.e., nutritionists),
and 3) positions within the early childhood programs that are not graded in alignment with
needs. These are areas where ADE struggles to recruit and hire qualified candidates (based
on available position grades and starting salaries) and to compete with the private sector.
These needs are discussed more extensively in ADE-18.
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions:
Based on direction from the Steering Committee, Transformation and Shared Services (TSS)
will assume responsibility for the Payroll and Help Desk functions statewide, as the first
Human Resources and Information Technology functions to transfer to TSS in a statewide
shared services model. Additional decisions on sequencing of further functions have not yet
been determined.
The recommended organization structure for ADE is shown in Figure 2.
Additional recommendations include:
• Each leader should continue to review their organization based on the recommendations
identified above.
• For the Chief of Staff, this recommendation includes creating an operations leadership
position over the shared services functions and retaining direct reports for four functional
areas and the special advisors. This reduces the direct reports almost in half.
• For the Deputy Commissioner’s organization, it is recommended to wait to make additional
until recent organizational changes have been implemented fully and can be assessed before
their impact. Determine if the Deputy’s direct reports can be grouped in a manner that
supports the workflow and reduces the impact to the Deputy.
Figure 2 – Recommended Organizational Structure by Function
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Meeting the Vision of an Effective and Efficient Future Department:
ADE leadership has prioritized areas of focus within each division, however additional, detailed work
is needed to implement desired changes. Assignment of a dedicated project manager is a key
enabling factor that will drive the additional work by supporting the leadership team in taking a
disciplined approach to reviewing each division’s structure in greater detail.
In addition to making key organization design changes, another critical factor toward achieving a
more efficient and effective organization is to the opportunity to review and strengthen polices and
procedures, establish standardization, and share best practices for rule promulgation and
escalation across divisions. Leadership has identified that there is variation in the rigor of policies
and procedures, as well as these additional capabilities, across divisions and program areas.
Learning Services, for example, has been identified as a leader in this area that could provide a model
to the remaining divisions.
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation
The complete list of the high priority Arkansas Forward initiatives for the department includes:
• ADE-0 – Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and efficiency
• ADE-9 – Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business critical/duplicative
applications across all divisions of ADE
• ADE-10 – Collaborate with Director of Building Authority (DBA) to reduce footprint and
increase ADE consolidation by end of 2024
• ADE-14 – Redesign ADE’s communications strategy
• ADE-17 – Introduce cross-training to enhance staff capabilities
• ADE-18 – Assess ADE's grades and positions to consolidate lower grades and hire fewer but
higher-grade jobs, ensuring talent sufficiency
ADE’s focus as a department is to achieve cost savings by reducing its non-critical/duplicative
technology applications and facilities footprint, and invest in its team and communication strategy
to improve service delivery to its stakeholders.
Initiative ADE #0 - Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and
efficiency
This initiative is a primary component of a core Arkansas Forward priority: for each cabinet-level
department to build an agile organization. It includes implementation of a tailored and modernized
organization to ensure effective distribution of management responsibilities, enhanced operational
efficiency, and improved role clarity among managerial positions. Factors that can impact an
organization’s effectiveness include managerial spans of control and layers, which can impact the
quality of supervision and staff development, the flow of information, and the efficiency of decision-
making.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Initiative Overview and Current State:
ADE’s responsibilities transformed significantly under the LEARNS Act, which offers an opportunity
to review how staff resources are assigned and ensure alignment with the priorities going forward.
The LEARNS Act Expanded ADE’s responsibilities to include early childhood programs and ADE has
gained several functions from the Department of Human Services (DHS). ADE has already conducted
one reorganization of this area, identifying at least two teams where there was an opportunity to
combine early childhood and K-12 program staff performing similar work (both to reduce duplication
and to bring consistency and shared best practices to both groups of staff). There is a need to review
whether additional duplication exists; the Deputy Commissioner and Assistant Commissioner for
Early Childhood Programs should collaborate to identify additional opportunities for consolidation.
Secretary Oliva’s span of control is focused, organization functions are grouped by each of the three
leaders appropriately, and the organization has successfully addressed some of the prior siloing that
had occurred through creation of its current teams. However, the organization’s design does pose
some challenges for leaders because the span of control for the leadership team is large (two have
15 and 17, respectively). The organization previously had an additional report to the Secretary which
helped to balance these responsibilities.
Rationale: Initiative ADE-0 directs ADE to implement a tailored and modernized organization
to ensure effective distribution of management responsibilities, enhanced operational
efficiency, and improved role clarity among managerial positions.
Opportunities identified for improvement based on leadership interviews include:
1. Review the first-line management structures for two of three divisions reporting to Secretary
Oliva (Chief of Staff and Deputy Commissioner). Two leaders have large spans of control: 15
and 17 staff, respectively. There is an opportunity to reduce the span of control for both the
Chief of Staff and the Deputy Commissioner, by adding a managerial position(s) to share
some of this workload. This introduces a new layer into the organization, that may on balance
prove beneficial to the organization.
2. Implement a position review for the Early Childhood division and K-12-focused programs to
ensure alignment with the LEARNS Act responsibilities and realign staffing as needed.
3. Identify workload metrics to inform the number of staff needed in each position type in the
Early Childhood and K-12 programs. One suggestion is to use a time study to collect
information on what these positions focus on and how they spend their time to help ADE drive
staff toward the highest value activities.
4. Review Early Childhood programs to identify opportunities to reduce duplication and
integrate these functions with other K-12 programs (i.e., nutrition programs and special
education programs have already been combined, but there may be other opportunities).
5. Review Higher Education division programs for opportunities to address some of the small
team sizes through potential consolidation of teams and the movement of some staff from
managerial roles to senior level individual contributor roles (with no reduction in pay). This
would require OPM-led changes to Arkansas’ personnel structures to create senior individual
contributor roles, which the state does not have today.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – ADE Work Plan provides the action steps in the
recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with ADE staff include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Assignment of a project management resource to this initiative would help the leadership
team to conduct the additional analysis needed to implement improvements to its
organization design.
• Support from a data analytics resource would assist this effort, as ADE seeks to measure
workload in a more quantitative manner including through the use of time studies or
leveraging existing metrics. For example, for staff that work in the schools, the metric may be
number of students served per unit of time.
• Support for change management from Secretary Oliva could increase the organization’s
readiness for reorganization. In town hall meetings, all staff emails, and other forums, the
Secretary can reinforce the importance of becoming a more agile organization while
providing reassurance that staff members have a role in this new organization, even if it is not
the same role they fill today.
• Use surveys and focus groups as appropriate to collect staff feedback during and after the
organization changes to support change management monitor the effectiveness of the
implementation.
Recommended steps for implementing new organization structure (future state):
• Identify project manager for agile organization initiative.
• Review each division’s organization chart (complete), including for span of control issues.
• Highlight areas for prioritized attention (complete).
• Each division leader to work with their team to conduct position review in alignment with
LEARNS Act.
• Each division leader to identify workload metrics to use in assessing the size of the team.
• Conduct time studies as appropriate.
• Each division leader to present recommendations for their organization to Secretary Oliva
for approval.
• Project manager to develop more detailed implementation plan for approved
recommendations.
• Develop communication plan for impacted staff.
• Implement recommendations.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Addressing the critical
staffing needs above and completing and implementing changes to its organization structure
supports ADE’s execution of its mission.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: ADE
leadership staff identified a need for more rigor in process and policy, particularly in areas of issue
escalation. If division staff, particularly within the K-12 and Early Childhood programs are able to
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
strengthen policy and adherence to it, this supports the larger span of control for the organization’s
leaders.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
Proposed metrics to assess the impact of this initiative include:
• Managerial Span of Control: Measure the average number of direct reports per manager and
track the percentage increase or decrease over time.
• Management Layers: Count the total number of hierarchical layers between the Secretary of
Education and front-line employees and track the reduction in layers.
• Employee Satisfaction: Conduct employee surveys to measure satisfaction scores related to
management support and role clarity, tracking the average score improvement over time.
In addition to these measures, surveys could be utilized for impacted staff during the transition to
identify and address any issues or concerns.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: This change is expected to have a fiscally neutral impact (positions would be
converted from managerial roles into contributing roles but at a comparable pay grade). This would
require OPM-led changes to Arkansas’s personnel structures to create senior individual contributor
roles, which the state does not have today.
Change Management Plan: Figure 3 includes key communication tasks to implement ADE-0. Key
activities and timing for communication plan are included in Appendix A – ADE Work Plan.
Figure 3 – ADE #0 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Staff impacted by When announcing time • Staff emails to • Secretary Oliva
changes study, messaging can announce time study. • Impacted Division
include: • Town hall. Leader
• We are conducting a • Face-to-Face team • Communication
study to help us meetings with Team
determine how we leadership, future
focus our resources manager, and former
and spend our time, manager.
and to ensure that
going forward, we
focus on the right
things.
• We will also gain
helpful information to
inform future process
improvement.
• Your cooperation and
diligent reporting is
essential to the
success of this effort.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
When communicating
staff changes:
• These changes are to
strengthen our team,
support collaboration,
and enable more
efficient decision-
making.
• Detailed description of
changes, including
specific changes for
every team impacted
by the reorganization:
new manager is
[insert]; former
manager is moving to
[role]. Everyone
continues to have a
place on the team.
Other ADE staff (not • These changes are to • Town hall. • Secretary Oliva
directly impacted) strengthen our team, • All staff email. • Impacted Division
support collaboration, Leader
and enable more • Communication
efficient decision- Team
making.
• High level summary of
changes.
Initiative ADE #9 – Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business
critical/duplicative applications across all divisions of ADE
This effort could be accomplished in a phased approach:
1. Initial assessment to gather application data and walk through assessment criteria (e.g.,
business criticality)
2. Identify and finalize candidate applications
3. Sunset plan and timeline for each application
4. Track value capture with TSS (e.g., reduction or reinvestment of contract hours)
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADE’s organization has grown over time, including
through the addition of other department programs to ADE (such as the Office of Early Childhood,
which was transferred from the Department of Human Services). To fulfill its mission, ADE’s
programs have built and purchased many applications to support business needs. Today, ADE
maintains approximately 125 applications, with an annual budget of $7.5-$10 million (the amount
has varied based on the maintenance and new development required in a given year). Based on
national benchmarking, Arkansas is in the top quartile of states in terms of spending on applications,
suggesting an opportunity for departments such as ADE to review these applications not only to
identify cost savings opportunities, but also to ensure resources are aligned strategically with
department priorities.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
This set of applications includes multiple aging and/or duplicative applications, with examples
including:
• KidCare, with 5 applications related to child care;
• IndaStar and various other manual processes for grant applications for school districts; and,
• Cognos business intelligence tool to support management in making decisions.
ADE’s Chief Information Officer (CIO) has begun to meet with ADE’ Secretary, Chief of Staff, Chief
Financial Officer, and Deputy Director on a quarterly basis to review and prioritize applications for
replacement and retirement. Out of this process, ADE has begun at least one new project to retire an
application (create child care replacement system which would allow the KidCare application to be
retired). The intent of this initiative is that ADE build on this work and undergo a more rigorous
prioritization exercise that would result in changes in resourcing and potentially sunsetting more
applications if appropriate.
Rationale: Initiative ADE-9 directs ADE to develop a strategy for the coordinated replacement and
retirement of non-business critical and duplicative applications given that:
• Aging applications, particularly those that continue to be operated by third parties, are more
expensive to maintain;
• There is an opportunity to streamline applications and replace legacy systems with recent
organizational changes (i.e., KidCare which was built on behalf of DHS); and,
• There is an opportunity for improved stakeholder experience by adding functionality to the
new applications. For example, because many of the existing applications were built as ADE
internal-only tools, they lack a customer-facing portal. When the KidCare application is
retired and new child care application is launched, it will include a public-facing portal.
ADE has developed a plan to retire the following applications over the next year:
• KidCare to be replaced by Child Care Replacement (CCR) web-based system, by November
2024;
• 17 grant applications, including the IndaStar system, which are used by school districts for
grant applications, with be replaced by a new application called “ARApp” (as mandated by
the LEARNS Act) in 2025; and,
• Cognos business intelligence tool to be replaced eventually by a combination of Snowflake,
PowerBI, and Tableau, timeline TBD.
In addition to these applications, ADE will undergo a more rigorous analysis to identify savings
opportunities in the following areas:
• Infrastructure and Operations Information Systems – ADE IT leadership will catalog
all ADE applications and current development and maintenance resourcing to produce a
complete picture of the department’s application footprint;
• District Operations – ADE IT will work to reduce licensing costs for the many applications
offered to school districts.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
• Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) – ADE will review SaaS subscriptions (such as Adobe) and
consider the number of licenses actually required and most cost-effective means of
purchase (such as State’s Master Outline Agreement).
• Other savings will be pursued related to the State’s Computer Purchase Program and
achieving process improvement through digital Transformation savings.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – ADE Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with ADE staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Approval of IT Resources: ADE has requested additional IT resources through Office of
Personnel Management. If ADE does not have the internal bandwidth to complete these
projects, it will use contracted resources at a higher cost.
• There is a need for ADE program and IT leadership to meet with Department of Transformation
and Shared Services (TSS) staff to understand the potential for external portal creation to
overlap TSS’ cross-departmental Data Warehouse and Government Services Portal
initiatives. In particular, the Government Services Portal initiative seeks to enhance citizen
interactions with government and minimize costs and duplication as departments digitize.
The intent of this coordination is not to preclude ADE from taking action to comply with the
LEARNS Act, but to ensure that this is accomplished in a manner that is complimentary with
TSS’ vision.
Recommended steps for replacing and retiring ADE legacy systems future state):
• Establish a review process to prioritize applications for replacement and retirement
(ongoing).
• Catalog all ADE applications and current development and maintenance resourcing to
produce a complete picture of the department’s application footprint;
• Identify and prioritize applications for replacement. Consider costs to maintain, number of
staff and external stakeholders impacted, and other criteria.
• Research potential market solutions to replace these applications to determine if ADE will
purchase or build the replacements.
• For high priority applications identified and prioritized, complete a high-level order of
magnitude analysis to identify expected costs and benefits (return on investment) from
replacement and identify resource needs.
• During the requirement gathering phase, IT to facilitate business process reengineering is
discussed before plans are confirmed for any development.
• Create a plan to summarize roadmap of expected applications for retirement over next two
years.
• Present the streamlined applications plan to Secretary Oliva for approval and feedback.
• Present plan to colleagues at Transformation and Shared Services Department of
Information Services for feedback and to ensure alignment with statewide strategy.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
• Identify funding needs and availability.
• Gather requirements to replace impacted applications.
• Impacted ADE divisions should map the “as is” and “to be” processes impacted by the
application to identify opportunities to streamline its work.
• For each application, develop a project plan.
• Negotiate any contracts with software vendors for the new solutions, ensuring favorable
terms and compliance with state procurement guidelines.
• Develop a communication plan to inform stakeholders of the replacement timeline.
• Develop training resources for internal and external users (videos, tutorials, frequently asked
questions).
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: ADE has an internal
information technology team led by its Chief Information Officer available to develop new
applications on ADE’s behalf. The CIO balances the bandwidth of the internal team with
augmentation by consultant resources to meet ADE’s IT needs. To the extent that replacement and
retirement of its applications can be spread out over time, ADE can take on a significant portion of
the development needed internally within existing resources. ADE has an in-process request with
Office of Personnel Management to expand its team resources.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: As ADE
builds new applications, particularly when creating new functionality for the public such as a public-
facing portal, there is an opportunity for manual business processes to be replaced by more efficient,
technology-enabled processes. Each division impacted by an application process should use
process mapping to document the current process as a baseline and solution with the team how
introduction of the new technology capabilities may inform process improvement. This work should
occur in parallel to requirements gathering to inform design of the new application. A key step
included in the work plan is for the IT Department to facilitate business process re-engineering in
partnership with the Chief of Staff and impacted program areas before completion of requirement
gathering to ensure that the new applications developed do not only reflect the current state, but
rather support process improvement.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
• Reduction in the number of active IT applications (potential for [20%]+ reduction)
• Decrease in annual IT spend by optimizing software licenses and maintenance costs
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: Based on initial estimates, ADE-9 has the potential for a significant positive financial
impact. While the full impact will be available upon completion of an application review process
(including for software as a service), the IT department has estimated an annual savings of $1.2
million. For applications that are eliminated and/or replaced, any expected savings from reducing
use of vendors to manage would be offset against costs of development for ADE’s IT Department. In
addition, some cost savings may not be available for capture and redirection, as some of this funding
would be federal funds and would be available for reinvestment in certain restricted program areas.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Change Management Plan: Depending on the applications identified for replacement, this
initiative will affect internal ADE staff and external stakeholder groups (e.g., KidCare will impact child
care stakeholders). This will necessitate comprehensive communication and training plans. ADE has
an opportunity to promote this initiative as a “win” for the many stakeholders who engage with ADE.
Figure 4 summarizes some of the key activities for communication plan; more detail is included in
Appendix A – ADE Work Plan.
Figure 4 – ADE #9 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
All Staff • ADE is embarking on a project to modernize Staff emails Communication
its applications, with the goal to improve Team
efficiencies for staff and the public.
• This investment will help ADE better fulfill
its mission.
Impacted • [INSERT NAME] application will be retired Staff emails Communication
Staff (provide timeframe). Team
• A new application will be built with your
support and expertise.
• The expected features of this new system
include [insert].
• Training will be provided to support you in
this transition.
Public • ADE is embarking on a project to modernize Social media, Communication
its applications, with the goal to improve website, and press Team
efficiencies for staff and the public. releases, stakeholder
• This investment will help ADE better fulfill emails, stakeholder
its mission. meetings (all
• The impacted applications include [insert]. channels).
• New features include [insert].
• Training resources will be available
including [insert].
Initiative ADE #10 - Collaborate with Director of Building Authority (DBA) to reduce
footprint and increase ADE consolidation by end of 2024
Support DBA efforts to increase Little Rock office occupancy and right-size total real estate portfolio
by:
1. Analyzing data on leased and owned properties (e.g., # of assigned personnel, # of total seats)
2. Participating in strategic planning exercises
3. Collaborating with DBA to reduce footprint
Initiative Overview and Current State: As ADE has grown in responsibility and staff, ADE’s team
has become dispersed across multiple locations in Little Rock, which includes 4 buildings that ADE
owns and 11 where ADE leases property from other State of Arkansas departments. ADE expends
$4.3 million in annual rent and mortgage payments and $2.0 million in annual operating costs for the
buildings it owns.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Rationale: ADE-10 directs ADE to consolidate its facility footprint within 2024 in collaboration
with DBA. Consolidation of ADE’s footprint within 2024 is a “quick win” for Arkansas Forward. Not
only will this consolidation into fewer buildings enhance staff collaboration through co-location (e.g.,
pair college and university education and career/technical tract staff and early childhood program
and pre-kindergarten staff), but also this represents a cost-effective strategy for ADE to reduce its
rent payments to enable reinvestment into its programs to benefit Arkansans.
ADE’s leadership team and DBA have developed a plan for three moves, impacting a total of
approximately 321-328 staff, during the remainder of 2024. Figure 5 provides a summary of this plan
to move staff out of three buildings (the Donaghey, Main Street, and Victory Buildings) mostly into 2
Capital Mall, a building currently owned and utilized by the Department of Commerce (ACOM). DBA
is working with ACOM to support its move, which would open space at 2 Capital Mall for ADE. ADE
and ACOM are entering into a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to enable ADE to move its staff
into the building while to remains under the partial use and ownership of ACOM. Eventually, with
federal and state approval, the building will be sold to ADE.
Figure 5 – ADE 2024 Staff Relocations
Move Detailed Relocation Date
1. Move ADE staff out of 1a. Relocate 79 Early Childhood staff from DHS July 8-12, 2024
DHS (Donaghey Plaza) (Donaghey Plaza) to 2 Capital Mall (Complete)
and 4 Capital Mall 1b. Relocate 10 Early Childhood staff from 4 Capital
Mall to 2 Capital Mall
1c. Relocate 40 Pre-K Child Nutrition staff from DHS
(Donaghey Plaza) to 2 Capital Mall
= 129 total staff
1c. Relocate 26 Part-C Federal Programs for Early
Childhood staff from DHS (Donaghey Plaza) to the
ground floor of 2 Capital Mall
= 26 total staff
2. Move ADE staff out of 3a. Relocate 42 ADHE staff from Main Street to 3 September 30, 2024
Main Street Capital Mall
th
3b. Relocate 10-15 IT staff from Main Street to the 5
floor of 2 Capital Mall
3c. Relocate 15-16 eFinance staff from Main Street to
the 5th floor of 2 Capital Mall
3d. Relocate 15-16 eSchool staff from Main Street to
the 4th floor MAC building
= 82-89 total staff
3. Move ADE staff out of 4a. Relocate 66 ADE staff special education and 18 December 31, 2024
Victory Building federal programs staff from Victory Building (1401 W
Capitol Avenue) to 2 Capital Mall
= 84 total staff
ADE has an assigned project manager, who is working closely with a project manager at ACOM and
the team at DBA to manage these moves. The first move was completed the week of July 8-12. For
each move, a series of steps will be executed to communicate with impacted staff, run background
checks for impacted staff (a requirement for any staff collocating with ACOM staff), ensure the
packing and moving of equipment occurs, contract with moving company, and reconnect
equipment.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – ADE Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with ADE include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Continue to collaborate with DBA through sale of the 2 Capital Mall building. Completing this
step will allow ADE to purchase the building, which is essential for the ADE to realize the
financial benefit (the annual mortgage payment is expected to be less than the rent ADE pays
for the impacted staff).
• Begin planning for background checks earlier in the process for subsequent moves. The
background check step requires staff to complete paperwork timely and sufficient time to
process the request prior to scheduled moves. If staff are unable to complete their
background check successfully, it delays their move.
Recommended steps for completing anticipated 2024 building moves:
ADE has completed the following preliminary steps:
• Developed moving plan
• Identified project managers at ADE
• Initiated execution of MOU with ACOM
• Initiated collaboration with DBA over sale of 2 Capital Mall Building
ADE has a work plan for each move, that includes the following steps:
• Conduct planning: Ensure there is space for each target move in the determined new
location, Review floor plans to estimate available space per FTE, Determine exact positions
and people impacted by each move.
• Work with Maintenance to design new Layout and Installation plan.
• Inform IT about move to ensure adequate planning for staff technology needs.
• Configure new space (IT) when existing staff have vacated the move.
• Communicate the move date and instructions to impacted employees.
• Complete employee background checks.
• Ensure employees follow timing and directions of packing belongings and equipment.
• Identify moving company.
• Ensure moving company moves belongings on project timeline.
• Complete equipment set up at each workstation and devices reconfigured.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This project does not
impact ADE’s staffing level. The department continues to use a dedicated project manager to support
future moves and ensure planning and communication is ongoing.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: The
business processes of the Facilities Team, which reports to ADE’s Chief Financial Officer, will change
when the portfolio of properties it maintains changes. Once each building move is complete, the
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
responsibilities of the Facilities Team should be reassessed and realigned because there is no longer
a need to support some of its existing properties and there will be a need to support 2 Capital Mall,
which has some specialized facility needs (e.g., boiler room). In addition, ADE should work with
ACOM to address overlap, as there are Facility staff based in 2 Capital Mall currently who may remain
assigned to the building (transferring from ACOM) or who may move to a new ACOM facility.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
• Net expenditure for rent and mortgage (annual) – This initiative is intended to reduce lease
expenditures and result in a net reduction in the total annual expenditure for rent and
mortgages.
• Commute time for employees through co-location – Assuming each employee commutes 10
minutes (one-way), one-time per week for a meeting in another building, this has the
potential to save approximately 5,000 employee hours per year.
• Employee satisfaction – This initiative is expected to increase employee satisfaction from
colocation with peers.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: Based on initial ADE estimates, ADE-10 has the potential positive annual
reoccurring financial impact of $190,000 (which assumes a net savings from reducing rent compared
to expected mortgage payments and operating costs). This estimate is based on analysis of the
current rent costs per square foot of rental buildings (i.e., the Donaghey and Victory buildings) and
the expected purchase price and operating costs of 2 Capital Mall. If this value is captured, ADE staff
anticipate it will be reinvested into department programming. This initiative could begin
implementation in 2024.
Change Management Plan: This initiative impacts staff in a variety of ways, including that it allows
for co-location of staff working in similar functional areas and will enhance collaboration, as well as
it may impact staff commutes and parking (which could be positive or negative). ADE’s project
manager is handling communication with staff about each move to ensure they understand the
timelines. There may be a need for ADE Secretary Oliva and the leadership team to reinforce the
positive impact of the moves through staff emails and town halls.
Figure 6 includes key activities and timing for communication plan are included in Appendix A – ADE
Work Plan.
Figure 6 – ADE #10 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Impacted • Key dates of the move impacting their Email. Secretary Oliva
Staff unit. Town halls and/or Greg Rogers
• Reinforcing positive benefits of division meetings. Impacted division
colocation. leads
Initiative ADE #14 – Redesign ADE’s communications strategy
Redesign ADE’s communications strategy with external stakeholder groups (e.g., superintendents,
parents) to ensure communications have the desired impact, while also improving the efficiency of
how ADE sends communications today:
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
1. Diagnose the current state of communications sent by ADE today and identify target
audience pain points
2. Design the future-state communication strategy based on pain points and gaps in the current
approach
Initiative Overview and Current State: Based on its mission and programming, ADE has a
critical need to communicate with several core audiences including:
• General Public • Students
• Teachers (pre-k through higher • Media
education) and Teachers in training • Local school communication
• Parents directors
• Elected officials (state, local) • Advocacy groups and associations
• Higher education leaders • Early childhood and child care
• Superintendents stakeholders
• Principals and other school • School boards
leadership • Retiree
Today, ADE uses a multi-channel approach to external communication, with three primary methods
including social media, website, and press releases. Other methods include a list serve for school
district audiences and presentations to stakeholder organizations.
Through work sessions with division staff and leadership, three key tools were created for the external
communication process: 1) a Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs and Customers (SIPOC) diagram
to capture key information about external communication, 2) a Strategic Compass to identify the goal
of the external communication process and high-level implementation steps, and 3) a more detailed
current state process map. The four diagrams are shown in Figures 7-10 and key findings include:
Figure 7 – ADE External Communication Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, and Customers
Diagram
Suppliers Inputs Processes Outputs Customers
• Vetted • Need to • Content release • Teachers
• Audit Sources
content communication typically • School Boards
• Auditee
• Mediums • Decide on a multiple at • Superintendents
Leadership
• Approval medium once • Parents
• Staff
• Stakeholder • Generate content • Website/social • General Public
leadership +
engagement • Approvals/Routing media, press • Students
watershed via
• Distribution • Release is release, • Retirees
leadership
Lists scheduled communication • Advocacy
• Internal via release,
websites, • Release • Release groups
Forms • Document/Preserve Secretary • Media
Youtube, message, GO in
Press, • FOIA communication • Local school
person
Governor’s communication
presentation,
Office, etc. directors
State Board
• Governor’s meetings,
Office media,
• Secretary streaming,
research
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Suppliers Inputs Processes Outputs Customers
• Focus Group reports, text
Engagement messaging
Unit services, FOIA
• Team over
Topic
• AAEA
• People we’ve
communicated
with
• Subjects
Source: Developed in work session with ADE staff in June 2024.
Figure 8 – External Communications Strategic Compass
Source: Developed in work session with ADE staff in June 2024.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Figure 9 – Existing External Communication Process
Source: Developed in work session with ADE staff in June 2024.
Rationale: Improving communication with its stakeholders has long been an ADE priority. Over
time, there have been prior initiatives to improve communication such as the 2018 Arkansas Family
and Community Engagement Framework (FACE), which was developed by Arkansas Department of
Education (ADE) in partnership with the State Board of Education, the Arkansas Family and
Community Engagement Coalition, Department of Human Services: Division of Child Care and Early
Childhood Education, and Arkansas stakeholders, to improve communication between families,
schools, and communities. More recently, with passage of the LEARNS Act, ADE invested in a
transparent website providing detailed progress on the implementation of the legislation and its
impact on stakeholders. Despite this emphasis and commitment to communication, there remain
many gaps in the existing internal communication strategies. In focus group with ADE staff, multiple
opportunities for improvement were identified:
• ADE lacks a robust, comprehensive distribution list for all stakeholders. Existing list serve
distribution lists are not up to date.
• ADE does not have a clear method to communicate in emergencies. There is a need to
establish a crisis management and post-disaster communication plan. The absence of this
system was experienced in 2023 during a tornado.
• ADE lacks some channels of communication that would be effective for many of its
stakeholders. For example, there is no mass text message option today (this requires opt-in).
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
• Certain channels are over-relied on and limited in utility. For example, the volume of emails
makes email not idea for certain audiences (teachers and students).
• The website is a primary communication channel, but has some challenges: links are broken,
site difficult to navigate, and overall, the site is not user-friendly.
• Stakeholders do not know where to go to find information. This is especially true for certain
groups such as parents.
• If ADE cannot control its messaging, there is a risk of messages being misrepresented by
news outlets and other groups. Reaching intended audiences directly is critical to avoid
misrepresentation and misinformation shared on social media and other outlets.
There are multiple examples of how state education agencies have supported communication
directly and between school districts and their stakeholders.
• The Center for American Progress did a US-wide review of communication strategies in
schools and the article includes state level recommendations on how states can support this
communication by providing technical assistance to school districts on parent engagement.1
• Hanover Research published best practices for districts and schools in communicating with
their stakeholders, which can also be applied to entities such as ADE. This review included
recommendations for communication frequency by audience and channels for
communication (i.e., primarily the same that ADE uses including website, social media) and
emergency communication including defining roles and responsibilities for multiple
functions during an emergency (e.g., team lead, spokesperson, and staff coordinator).2
• Statewide Longitudinal Data Systems issued a best practices report on communication “dos
and don’ts” for state education agencies. An excerpt includes:3
o Do: Identify and engage stakeholders early; be inclusive; follow through on
commitments; acknowledge stakeholder needs/differences and tailor approach; and
give stakeholders credit for system design.
o Do not: Engage in large-scale open forums; fail to acknowledge political environment;
fail to follow through.
Some states have also developed unique programming to better outreach to parents, a key
stakeholder group. Figure 10 illustrates some of these strategies: 4
1
Meg Banner and Abby Quirk, American Progress, “One Size Does Not Fit All,” 2020,
https://www.americanprogress.org/article/one-size-not-fit/)
2
Hanover Research, “Communication Strategies for Districts and Schools,” September 2020, https://wasa-
oly.org/WASA/images/WASA/6.0%20Resources/Hanover/Hanover%20Research---
Communication%20Strategies%20for%20Districts%20and%20Schools.pdf.
3
SLDS, “Best Practices Brief: Stakeholder Communication Tips from the States,” May 2011.
4
Comprehensive Care Network, Topical Brief, “State Approaches to Parent Family Engagement.”
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Figure 10 – Excerpt of State Strategies to Support Parent/Family Engagement
Source: This figure is reprinted from the Comprehensive Care Network’s Topical Brief on Parent Engagement.
Implementation Considerations:
ADE staff identified barriers and risks to implementing improved stakeholder communication,
summarized in Figure 11.
Figure 11 – ADE Staff Interference Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with ADE staff in June 2024.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Staff prioritized the four most pressing issues:
• Do not have robust distribution list for all stakeholders
• Do not have clear method to communicate in an emergency
• Parents do not know where to go to get information
• Messages are sometimes misrepresented by news outlets and groups
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Create an opt-in text messaging program (possibly a general and specialized programs). This
addresses the distribution list and can pre-empt misinformation.
• Establish a state emergency communication plan.
• Once a comprehensive set of strategies to improve stakeholder communication is identified,
use a widespread campaign to increase knowledge and promote use of these channels.
• Consult stakeholders in the design of new communication strategies. Methods to solicit
stakeholder input such as surveys focus groups, and interviews should be used to capture
input from each of the core stakeholder groups.
Recommended steps for establishing new external communication strategies (future state):
Based on a process mapping session with ADE leadership and staff, Figure 12 presents the future
state process, with changes noted in green and red. In sum, this process includes proposed changes
in message development and implementation of greater use of analytics to monitor messaging post-
release. In addition, the process map includes identification of additional components or steps that
staff have identified as high value in improving stakeholder engagement. This process improvement
is intended to be augmented through ideas generated by specific stakeholder groups, as
recommended in the action plan.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Figure 12 – Future State External Communication Process
Source: Developed in work session with ADE staff in July 2024.
To achieve this future state, the following steps are suggested to move the work forward:
• Conduct research with each target audience group.
• Design the ideal “future state” for each target audience group based on interviews and known
communication gaps, mapping out:
o The communications they should receive
o When they should receive each type of communication
o What forms of communication the content should take (e.g., video, audio, written
text)
• Identify solutions to meet the needs of each stakeholder group (the “to be” state). Prepare a
high-level rough order of magnitude analysis to calculate the expected costs and benefits of
each initiative and the resource needs.
• Review the capacity of the ADE communications team to manage these channels and
identify additional support as needed (intended to be cost neutral).
• Develop a communication plan for the new available methods of communication.
• Develop training resources for stakeholder if required (videos, frequently asked questions).
Based on staff recommendations, the following items were deprioritized as longer-term solutions
that can be incorporated into a future phase of this project:
• Need to get access to translation services
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
• Communicate with news channels at individual schools
• Advocate for communication liaisons in school districts
• Build capacity in staff member skills
• Have clear guidelines available for all staff
• Request schools tag/hashtag ADE in posts on social media
• Sample testing of messaging with target audiences
• Have leadership meeting to determine appropriate communications identity within 1 ADE
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: ADE has a communication
lead and a total communication staff of 6. Based on the strategies recommended by stakeholders
and ADE’s assessment of their feasibility, ADE may require more resources to implement them fully.
It is recommended this be accomplished in a fiscally neutral manner by using available vacancies.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: Process
changes are anticipated. Figure 12 provides the anticipated “to be” state.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The goals of this initiative are to support ADE’s engagement of stakeholder segments who are
reached inconsistently today (full list is shown above) through new channels of communication and
to meet stakeholder needs better through clear and consistent communication, preventing the need
for additional follow-up from stakeholders. Some of the performance measures that can be used to
assess ADE’s progress in achieving these goals include:
• Stakeholder use of communication channels (website visits, social media interactions, text
opt-in rates) – The volume increase in utilization of these channels is not the end goal of this
initiative however monitoring these statistics will provide directional guidance to the
department in refining this approach.
• Number of stakeholder outreaches by type – ADE will measure the number of calls, emails,
and other inbound inquiries from stakeholders. This measure is meant to be analyzed in
context with the usage of alternate channels (see prior measure) to determine if stakeholders
are having their needs met through other options. It is also meant to be analyzed in context
with the next measure of the average response time to ensure ADE is responsive to those who
choose to contact the department directly for information.
• Average number of days to respond to consumer inquiries – ADE should establish target
response times for calls, emails, and social media posts to ensure ongoing responsiveness
to stakeholders.
• Time to production of press releases – This metric will assess ADE’s ability to develop
messaging in ad hoc or reactive situations more quickly due to establishment of an efficient
process.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: Based on initial estimates, ADE-14 is anticipated to result in modest time savings
for the communication team and the leadership team, based on adoption of a more proactive
communication stance and establishment of additional channels of communication to reach
stakeholders who may otherwise contact the department directly for information. ADE’s Information
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Technology team is anticipated to make any changes to ADE’s website to accommodate this project.
ADE could incur new costs to establish a statewide text message notification system if that is a final
recommendation for implementation. It is anticipated that this funding would be available within
existing resources (i.e., Lottery proceeds). It is anticipated the department will spend Q4 2024
collecting stakeholder input and this initiative would be implemented in 2025.
Change Management Plan: This initiative will impact ADE’s stakeholders. The intent is for
stakeholders to more widely utilize ADE’s communication strategies. Clear communications and
training materials (if required) will be important for ADE to realize the return on investment of this
project. Key communication messages are included in Figure 13. Activities and timing for
communication plan are included in Appendix A – ADE Work Plan.
Figure 13 – ADE #14 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Stakeholder • Invitations for engagement in listening Press release Communications
Groups and design sessions Website team
• Surveys offer opportunity to provide Social Media
input Email
Stakeholder • Ongoing messaging on development of Website Communications
Groups solutions and timelines Social Media team
Stakeholder • Initial message to announce new Press release Communications
groups communication strategy and vehicles. Website team
• These strategies were developed in Social Media
partnership with stakeholder Text and voice
community. messaging
• This project represents an investment Email
by ADE to be more responsive to the Blogs
stakeholders it serves.
Stakeholder • Detail on training resources to support Website Communications
Groups utilization. Email team
• Ongoing messaging to increase uptake Blogs
and engagement Videos
Social Media
Initiative ADE #17 – Introduce cross-training to enhance staff capabilities
Introduce cross-training to 1) Ensure that more than one person knows how to do critical tasks at
ADE, thereby reducing delays/hold-ups when they are out or at capacity, and 2) provide motivated
employees with opportunities to build their skill set and advance in their careers at ADE.
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADE has 815 employees (as of July 2024). There are
certain critical roles within the ADE organization where there is no redundancy (estimated to be 30
employees), meaning that there may be critical delays when these staff are at capacity, and if staff
are out of office or leave ADE, the organization is at risk. There are also staff units with high workload
(which may or may not be seasonal) or higher staffing vacancies, which results in overtime worked
by existing staff in filled positions. This workload imbalance can contribute to turnover, low morale,
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
and dissatisfaction. There is no existing staff satisfaction survey to measure employee satisfaction
and morale regarding volume of work, among other issues.
Rationale: ADE -17 directs the ADE to use cross-training as a method to provide redundancy in
key areas and address capacity issues, while also creating a mechanism for staff to enhance
their skills and experience growth by working with other business units.
Human Resources staff can manage a process to pair business units where there is a need for
support and areas that have excess capacity. HR can oversee that the on-the-job training and
shadowing needed to develop the supporting team occurs.
Cross-training will not only allow for direction of excess staff time to areas with need but will elevate
the skillset of ADE employees and promote longevity. Workforce development studies have
established that cross-training and skill-building are linked to greater employee satisfaction and
retention and has also been linked as a strategy to improve morale for under-utilized staff and prevent
burnout. This strategy has been used throughout federal, state, and local governments. For example,
the California Department of Human Resources included cross-training is in CalHR’s Workforce
Plan. They have developed a tool kit to support establishment of such a program including how to
capture and pair staff with appropriate needs, a template for a training plan, a training plan, and tools
to set expectations for staff and managers, among others.5 The City of Cody Wyoming used cross-
training to address gaps in multiple departments including in the Parks Department and Department
of Streets and Sanitation. 6
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – ADE Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with ADE staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• HR will need to be proactive in working with managers to find teams with the capacity to be
cross trained. There may be reluctance for a manager or staff to admit that they are not fully
utilized now and have capacity.
• ADE may want to build accountability for the secondary assignment into an affected
employee’s annual evaluation. If an employee’s productivity for their secondary assignment
is not monitored and part of their evaluation, the employee may treat this role as optional and
not provide the level of support the unit expects.
• There is a need to identify a mechanism to compensate staff for additional work performed
to provide an incentive for employees to embrace this program. There is a statutory provision
(Act 172) that provides a means to offer a ten per cent increase as well as a lump sum for
5
CalHR, “CalHR Cross Training,” July 2018, https://www.calhr.ca.gov/workforce-planning/Documents/calhr-
cross-training-handbook-workshop-sample.pdf.
6
Government Finance Officers Association, Mark Mack, “Employee Cross-training Employee Cross-training
How small governments can improve efficiency and reduce their risk,” 2020,
https://gfoaorg.cdn.prismic.io/gfoaorg/41c9305f-7a83-4452-894d-be213c0bdf4e_GFR_10-
2020_EmployeeCrossTraining.pdf.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
$5,000 or 40 hours of leave for employees that take on additional duties, but there are
restrictions and a department’s plan must be approved by OPM and the Legislature prior to
implementation.
• HR has onboarded a new staff position to support a variety of projects and can be the
coordinator for ADE-17. Identify a lead within the HR organization will help to sustain this
initiative.
• Once the HR Lead pairs units and ensures training occurs, the HR Lead will need to
communicate on an ongoing basis with the impacted managers and staff to ensure the
success of the program. Support for the initiative will extend beyond the initial pairing of the
units, including to strengthen the relationship between the unit and its cross-trained support
team.
Recommended steps for establishing a cross-training program (future state):
• Division leaders will identify instances in which their team could be supported with a cross-
trained support team and where they have capacity to provide staff to support other areas.
• The HR Lead will pair identified units and oversee creation of a training plan.
• The team requesting support will establish an on-the-job training and shadowing plan to
• The managers of the paired teams will co-conduct team meetings and other events to
strengthen the relationship between the teams and support collaboration.
• The manager of the support team will identify annual goals with each employee supporting
another team to add accountability to their annual performance evaluation and seek
feedback from the manager of the unit their employee supports in preparing the evaluation.
• HR will establish an evaluation plan for the program, including meeting with all paired teams
at least quarterly to monitor the implementation.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative is a strategy
to leverage the skills and capacity of ADE’s current team to support high-impact activities where
there is no redundancy in the staff performing those duties, in areas that are under-staffed, and in
areas with high workload (or high seasonal workload). Over time, this effort will strengthen the skills
of ADE’s staff, through exposure to additional areas.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: A cross-
training program will need to be established, but this is not expected to impact other existing
business processes.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
• Job satisfaction for cross-trained employees – This initiative is expected to increase
satisfaction among the employees who receive cross-training, who feel they are developing
and progressing in their careers.
• “Work stoppage” delays in critical areas and staff productivity – This initiative is expected to
reduce these incidences and increase staff productivity.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: Based on initial estimates validated by the department, ADE-17 has the potential
positive annual reoccurring efficiency impact of $100,000, which includes cost avoidance based on
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
the assumption that there are approximately 30 employees who perform critical work, they are out
of office a total of 24 days per year (sick and vacation leave), and up to 50% of their workload could
be provided by cross-trained staff. However, because the impact of this is diffused across the
organization and will not directly reduce salary expenditures, it cannot be captured as cost savings.
This does not reflect any additional compensation for staff, as that plan has not been identified or
approved by OPM. This initiative could begin implementation within calendar year 2024.
Change Management Plan: This initiative requires the buy-in of management and staff who can
be cross-trained to support critical functions lacking resources or redundancy. Figure 14 provides a
summary of the communication tasks. Key activities and timing for communication plan are included
in Appendix A – ADE Work Plan.
Figure 14 – ADE-14 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
All Staff • ADE is launching a Town halls, team Chief of Staff
new cross-training meetings, and all staff Courtney Salas-Ford
program (add program emails. HR Director Scott
details). Face-to-face leadership Carnes
• HR will manage this meetings.
program by identifying
both teams with
needs and teams with
capacity.
• This program is a way
to provide immediate
relief to high-volume
units to expand their
capacity and prevent
disruption when staff
are at capacity our out
of office.
• This program is a
great way to expand
skills and gain
visibility to other
programs at ADE.
Management • Volunteering to be Chief of Staff
cross-trained/ Courtney Salas-Ford
volunteering your unit HR Director Scott
for cross-training is an Carnes
important
contribution to the
organization’s
success.
• No punitive action will
be taken toward
teams who identify
excess capacity.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Initiative ADE #18 – Assess ADE's grades and positions to consolidate lower grades
and hire fewer but higher-grade jobs, ensuring talent sufficiency
Identify unmet business needs that can be addressed through the hiring of more experienced
candidates, to be achieved in a fiscally neutral manner by consolidating vacant lower-grade positions
to create fewer higher-grade positions.
Initiative Overview and Current State: As divisions within ADE have reviewed their organization
chart to design an agile organization that allows the department to execute its mission best, some
leaders have identified a need for specialized and/or higher-grade positions that will address critical
needs. There is misalignment in the areas where ADE has authority to hire (available vacant
positions) and current business needs.
Some of the critical staffing areas where ADE desires to upgrade key positions include:
• Generally, it is challenging to recruit candidates for GS 8 and 9 positions because of state
increases in teacher salaries. These positions require a teaching license and qualified
teachers can earn more and/or the same amount for working in a school for a 9-month time
period as opposed to a 12-month period at the state.
• ADE has a difficult time competing with the private sector for certain positions at the School
for the Deaf and School for the Blind (e.g., nutritionists) based on how they are currently
graded.
• There are positions within the Early Childhood division where the skillset is not totally aligned
with how the positions are graded and finding qualified candidates is challenging.
Rationale: Initiative ADE-18 helps ADE to address workforce needs by identifying and consolidating
certain vacancies into fewer, higher-grade positions (fiscally neutral), pending OPM and Legislative
approval. This initiative addresses division needs to fill certain skilled positions with more seasoned
candidates and helps ADE compete with the private sector in hiring top talent.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – ADE Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with ADE staff include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• This initiative requires Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and Legislative approval. This
analysis assumes timely approval of this request is needed for ADE to realize the benefit of
this initiative.
Recommended steps to develop a staffing proposal to meet ADE’s workforce needs (future
state):
• ADE’s Human Resources Leader will create and review a position control report and identify
vacancies by division.
• Each division will identify and submit staffing needs.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
• Human Resources Leader and Chief of Staff will review recommendations and present to
Secretary Oliva for approval.
• Human Resources team will work with OPM to obtain approval and implement.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This recommendation
seeks to improve ADE’s ability to deliver on department priorities by investing in key, strategic
positions in using a fiscally neutral mechanism. Each of the recommended positions will provide a
mission-critical function.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: N/A
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
• Caliber of candidates to address business needs – This initiative is expected to increase the
caliber of candidates sourced to ADE.
• Ability of state to compete with private sector in hiring top talent – This initiative is
anticipated to increase the state’s ability to compete with the private sector.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: This initiative is likely to generate salary savings, but until the divisions identify
specific needs and available vacancies, the amount expected is indeterminable. This initiative could
begin implementation in 2024, pending OPM and Legislative Approval.
Change Management Plan: This initiative does not require a change management plan.
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ADE Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
Strategic Management Plan:
Arkansas Department of Finance and Administration
Table of Contents
Overview ............................................................................................................................... 2
Recommended Organizational Structure ................................................................................ 3
Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and efficiency - Initiative DFA #0 .............................. 7
How this Department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective future department ............................ 10
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation ......................................... 10
Strategy: Improve Online Customer Experience............................................................................ 11
Update DFA website to increase customer satisfaction and increase efficiency - Initiative DFA #9 ................. 12
Map and enhance DMV processes with technology to improve speed and service - Initiative DFA #8 ............ 17
Create a single sign-on licensing portal with direct document upload - Initiative DFA #14 .............................. 26
Strategy: Customer Experience at SRO Initiatives ......................................................................... 28
Train all DFA employees on customer experience standards - Initiative #44 .................................................... 29
Map DFA processes, identify issues, and improve efficiency and satisfaction - Initiative #18 .......................... 33
Strategy: Improve Customer Experience with Tax Initiatives ......................................................... 42
Assess opportunity for implementing data-driven audits - Initiative DFA #45 .................................................. 42
Create response management system to decrease response times and increase accuracy of information -
Initiative DFA #23 ............................................................................................................................................... 45
Implement customer-centered tax auditor training within the Division of Field Audit at DFA to enhance
cooperation - Initiative DFA# 11 ........................................................................................................................ 52
Strategy: Improve Staff Experience .............................................................................................. 59
Expand DFA University (DFA-U) to better invest in emerging leaders for future leadership - Initiative DFA #3 59
Establish a feedback system for employees to improve workplace conditions - Initiative DFA #25 ................. 65
Track and maximize fleet usage across departments - Functional Initiative 608 .............................................. 71
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
1
Overview
The Arkansas Department of Finance and Administration (DFA) oversees the state’s taxing authority,
state budget, accounting, motor vehicle administration, driver services, and regulation of industries such
as alcohol, tobacco, medical marijuana, casino gambling, and live horse racing. Additional services and
divisions within DFA include Child Support Enforcement, Assessment Coordination, Intergovernmental
Services, the Arkansas Scholarship Lottery, and Information Services. DFA has more than 2,200
employees across its divisions. As a result of these broad responsibilities, DFA serves multiple
constituents including citizens, businesses, and other state departments.
Secretary Jim Hudson and DFA’s leadership team have established customer experience as the
department’s highest priority while ensuring state residents receive appropriate services. This
prioritization was informed by a 2022 McKinsey & Company “State-of-the-States” survey, which
established a strong link between customer experience and resident satisfaction and illustrated that
customer experience improvements can have tremendous benefits for government agencies and their
staff and stakeholders (summarized in Figure 1).
Figure 1 – Benefits to State Agencies from Improving Customer Experience
Source: McKinsey & Company, 2022 State-of-the-States Survey.
Moreover, the same McKinsey & Company survey also showed that services that have the highest
impact on driving overall satisfaction with state services are vehicle and tax services.
With that framework in mind and through the Arkansas Forward project, a 2024 initiative to improve the
efficiency and effectiveness of Arkansas’ 15 cabinet-level departments, DFA realigned its organizational
structure to strengthen its ability to perform core roles and responsibilities and prioritized
implementation of 12 initiatives that drive improvements in customer and staff experience in four key
strategies: 1) online customer experience, 2) customer experience with state revenue offices, 3)
customer experience with motor vehicle and taxation, and 4) staff experience.
This Strategic Management Plan (“Plan”) memorializes the work completed by DFA during Arkansas
Forward, translating the department’s vision into a plan consisting of recommended organizational
structure, key initiatives prioritized for immediate implementation, and related performance
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2
metrics. A companion project plan (“Work Plan”) provides a more detailed resource to support
implementation of the initiatives by DFA’s Arkansas Forward project management team.
Recommended Organizational Structure
DFA’s current organization chart is shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2 – Current Organizational Structure
As part of Arkansas Forward, DFA’s structure was reviewed to identify opportunities for redesign in
three areas:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission;
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives; and,
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions (i.e.,
information technology, human resources, procurement).
Historically, DFA has undergone reductions in force and taken other measures to become a leaner
organization. When reviewing span of control, many managers in the organization have large spans of
control and the organization has limited specialized staff in certain functional areas for special projects,
training, project management, and change management, which can negatively impact customer
experience. Arkansas Forward offers an opportunity for DFA to review its mission and organization to
identify areas where reinvestment into the organization is necessary to meet critical customer
experience needs.
As part of Arkansas Forward, DFA undertook a review of each department’s organization to identify
opportunities to create a more agile organization, considering span of control, number of managerial
layers, opportunities for internal shared services consolidation within DFA, repurposing of existing
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
3
positions, among other factors. The needs of each division were distinct, based on the specialized
mission of the organization and a variety of statutory and external constraints.
Recommendations based on department interviews and data analysis are included in Figure 3:
Figure 3 – Future State Organization Recommendation
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission:
o Enabling SROs/DMV/DMSV to continue to close and consolidate offices based on
demand: Enabling DFA to take action to align its work force to citizen demand, while
balancing the needs of rural communities, is one of the most impactful actions that can
be done to support creation of an efficient and organizational structure within the
Revenue division.
DFA operates approximately 133 SROs statewide to serve the citizens of Arkansas. This
office structure has had a significant impact on the size of DFA’s management team. DFA
typically staffs each SRO with a team including a supervisor. While many of these teams
may be considered small (with less than four employees), presence of these supervisors
is an important strategy in handling issues locally and preventing the need for
escalation.
Because DFA has experienced external pressure to retain offices in certain locations,
DFA has employed multiple strategies to utilize its team cost-effectively including: using
“rover” managerial positions to provide coverage over multiple offices, reducing hours
or days of service in lesser-utilized offices, and maintaining a lean overall management
structure with large span of control for the five director positions (who manage between
approx. 30-42 direct reports each).
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4
The team uses a data-driven approach to allocate work and managerial responsibilities,
and periodically identifies offices for closure, consolidation, or reduced hours. Figures 4
and 5 provide a 2024 year-to-date transaction summary for the approximately 10 most
and least utilized offices, with the 2020 county population included for context. As is
demonstrated here, there is a significant variation between offices in the amount of
work performed (correlation to population and the number of other offices available
with in the county).
Figure 4 – Top 10 SRO Locations by Transactions Performed, Year-to-Date 2024
Office County Transactions County Population
Bentonville SRO 0401 Benton 71,881 284,333
Springdale SRO 7203 Washington 64,833 245,871
Conway SRO 2301 Faulkner 52,421 123,498
Fayetteville SRO 7201 Washington 49,003 245,871
Fort Smith E SRO 6603 Sebastian 48,898 127,799
LR Central SRO 6006 Pulaski 48,257 399,125
LR West SRO 6003 Pulaski 46,771 399,125
Jonesboro SRO 1601 Craighead 46,602 111,231
Benton SRO 6301 Saline 39,915 123,416
Rogers SRO 0408 Benton 38,156 284,333
Source: SRO transaction data provided by DFA. 2020 County Census data used for population estimate.
Figure 5 – Bottom 10 SRO Locations by Transactions Performed, Year-to-Date 2024
Office County Transactions County Population
Des Arc SRO 5903 Prairie 3,887 8,282
McGehee SRO 2103 Desha 3,771 11,395
Hampton SRO 0701 Calhoun 3,518 4,739
Charleston SRO 2401 Franklin 3,453 17,097
Rector SRO 1103 Clay 3,399 14,552
Hazen SRO 5902 Prairie 2,821 8,282
Clarendon SRO 4802 Monroe 2,809 6,799
Dermott SRO 0903 Chicot 2,030 10,208
Earle SRO 1806 Crittenden 1,591 48,163
Hughes SRO 6204 St. Francis 1,442 23,090
Source: SRO transaction data provided by DFA. 2020 County Census data used for population estimate. Note:
Offices already on reduced schedules/hours are excluded from this table.
Based on analysis of workload for all office locations, DFA could target ten offices for
either closure or reduced hours and use this approach on an ongoing basis to realign its
workforce to volume of work.
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5
A challenge for DFA in right-sizing its resources has been external pressure to keep
certain office locations. Given the significant investments DFA is making in self- service
digital functionality, the DFA team will need to continue to educate stakeholders and
the public about digital options and seek support as part of Arkansas Forward for its
authority to take additional actions as needed to create the most cost-effective office
structure.
o Making targeted investments to help certain divisions execute on their mission, with
examples of these investments including:
Four additional legal staff (Managing Attorneys) to be located in the new legal
unit but support the Revenue division to support general questions, rulemaking,
and legal opinions (GS-13);
Dedicated training resources for multiple teams within the Revenue division (1
Training Program Manager-GS-14; 6 training leads to report to Revenue Division
leads in State Revenue Offices, Division of Motor Vehicles, Office of Child
Support Enforcement, Income Tax, Excuse Tax, and Field Audit-GS-12; and
trainers to support the divisions with the largest field staff including 5 for SRO
and 4 for OCSE-GS-09). This investment in a small training team is meant to
improve the productivity of the entire 1,900+ staff in the Revenue division by
helping staff perform their jobs better, allowing leadership staff to focus on
other areas instead of having to conduct on-the-job training as occurs today,
and creating a pool of highly skilled resources that can support surges in
demand or handle complex matters;
Internal communication lead to support the change management surrounding
DFA’s efforts to become more customer focused;
Project management support for the key Arkansas Forward and other customer
experience projects; and,
Five fraud prevention and analytics resources, including three reporting to the
Income Tax Team and one each reporting into to the Excise and Field Tax teams-
GS-13.
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives: To create the most
efficient organization, DFA identified the following opportunities:
o DFA has centralized certain functions previously (human resources and mostly
information technology) but some additional opportunities to centralize were identified
to create a central legal team and to further consolidate IT resources (pending statewide
shared services actions).
o The Arkansas Scholarship Lottery (Lottery) has further opportunities to strengthen its
relationships with other divisions at DFA, including with the Tobacco Control Board and
Alcohol Beverage Control Board. There are already efforts in process to improve
coordination, including adoption of a single licensing platform among these entities
which would improve the experience for their customers, many of whom are in common
(e.g., grocery stores, liquor stores). Staff identified opportunities to achieve additional
administrative efficiencies, support process improvement, and improve customer
experience through this collaboration. Some statutory remedies may be needed if there
are collaboration challenges to greater collaboration. Rather than remove
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
6
staff from the Lottery organization to report into other central teams, the
recommendation is for the Lottery to retain its current organization structure but
establish dotted line reporting between the areas where DFA otherwise has shared
services functions (IT, Legal, etc.). This approach would help Lottery realize benefits of
this enhanced collaboration in a more gradual fashion.
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions: Based
on direction from the Steering Committee, Transformation and Shared Services (TSS) will
assume responsibility for the Payroll and Help Desk functions statewide, as the first Human
Resources and Information Technology functions to transfer to TSS in a statewide shared
services model. Additional decisions on sequencing of further functions have not yet been
determined.
Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and efficiency - Initiative
DFA #0
This initiative includes overseeing implementation of a tailored and modernized organization (including
managing initiative sub-charters) to ensure effective distribution of management responsibilities,
enhanced operational efficiency, and improved role clarity among managerial positions.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DFA’s divisions are unique and distinct in their
responsibilities. There can be a tendency for the divisions to work independently due, in some cases to
their former status as freestanding departments. In addition, some divisions maintain duplicative
functions due to the specialized natures of the work. Some divisions, such as the Revenue Division,
maintain a lean operating structure, with large spans of control among leaders. There are many small
units with 0-2 or 2-4 employees, particularly when considering the SROs.
Rationale: As part of Initiative DFA-0, to create the most efficient organization, DFA identified
opportunities to:
• Continue with its shared services approach: DFA has centralized certain functions previously
(human resources and mostly information technology) but some additional opportunities to
centralize were identified:
o Legal – Legal resources are located throughout DFA’s divisions including the Arkansas
Scholarship Lottery (known herein as “Lottery”), Child Support Enforcement, the
Revenue Division, and within the Arkansas Tobacco Commission and Arkansas Beverage
Commission. There is a need to elevate a leader responsible for all DFA’s legal services
that can act as an escalation point to the Secretary and supervise other legal staff.
However, there are some instances (Lottery and Child Support Enforcement) where a
dotted line relationship into this central team better supports other policy objectives of
those divisions. DFA intends to hire four additional attorneys as part of this central team
to support the Revenue Division with inquiries, rulemaking, and legal opinions.
o Information Technology – Most of these resources are centralized. There are some IT
resources within the Lottery including Help Desk and Application Support. The Help Desk
resources could be consolidated with the other Help Desk resources at DFA and a dotted
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
7
line established between the Application Support staff and the DFA IT leadership to
establish some collaboration between the teams. There are some policy reasons the IT
staff may need to remain within the Lottery Team, including that the positions are self-
funded from Lottery proceeds and expected to be dedicated to the Lottery.
• The Arkansas Scholarship Lottery (Lottery) has further opportunities to strengthen its
relationships with other divisions at DFA, including with the Tobacco and Alcohol Beverage
Control Boards. Not only are there administrative benefits and process improvement
opportunities (which could be achieved through a dotted line reporting relationship), but also
there are even greater benefits to the end user (e.g., convenience stores, liquor stores) which
may interact with multiple state programs today and could experience improved streamlining of
services and other benefits. In addition to the dotted line structure, DFA’s shared services
functions should forge more intentional linkages with their counterparts within the Lottery
division (i.e., include them in team meetings and communications, establish recurring
interactions).
• Make some targeted investments in staffing including by creating a dedicated training unit. This
team would support new hires and offer ongoing development for staff within the Revenue
division (see detailed allocation above).
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – DFA Work Plan provides the action steps in the
recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation
process identified through interviews and work sessions with DFA staff include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
Communicating clearly to the broader DFA organization about the purpose of these changes will support
the reorganization. Addition of an internal communication resource to support this and other Arkansas
Forward initiatives will support the change management.
Recommended steps to implement changes to DFA’s organization structure include:
• Create a Central Legal Team, which would include direct reports of all legal resources except the
Lottery division, with Alcohol and Tobacco Control divisions, Assessment Coordination, and Child
Support Enforcement (which would be dotted line reports into this team);
• Establish new dotted line reporting relationships for Lottery Functions where there is a shared
services team (IT, Legal, Communication);
• Move IT Help Desk resources to IT shared services at DFA (this should be delayed pending
statewide shared services actions);
• Make targeted investments to help certain divisions execute on their mission, with examples of
these investments including:
o Four new legal staff to the new legal shared services team to support the Revenue
division;
o Multiple training resources embedded throughout the Revenue division (see above);
o An internal communication lead to support the change management surrounding DFA’s
efforts to become more customer-focused;
o Project management support for the key Arkansas Forward and other customer
experience projects; and,
o Fraud prevention and analytics resources.
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
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• Create dedicated training unit within Revenue division, hiring a Training Program manager and a
highly skilled team of leads and trainers;
• Establish a clear communication plan and point of contact regarding all staff moves and ensure
leaders understand “why” behind moves and can support change;
• Ensure provision of team-building and training resources to support formation and high
functioning of teams impacted by organizational moves;
• Review select program areas for process standardization and staff training opportunities
including legal services, the Lottery, and Alcohol Beverage and Tobacco Control functions;
• Use process mapping to compare the work flows and tools of the teams;
• Review skills and provide training to elevate the quality of the work for any staff moving to a
shared service function;
• Monitor the impact of proposed changes through use of a staff engagement survey to monitor
the changes (either overall or within affected departments); and,
• Build accountability for shared services staff by involving division heads (and customers) in staff
evaluations.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: The proposed organization chart
for DFA is provided above in Figure 3. Realignment of DFA in these areas will help the department
further achieve its mission and implement Arkansas Forward.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: Formation of
one legal team will result in the need for new escalation protocol to the leader and eventually to the
Secretary. If processes are mapped and compared, further improvement is possible.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: This change is expected to have an upfront
investment in the new staff positions (e.g., leader of legal function, other staff functions discussed
above).
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: Proposed metrics to assess the
impact of this initiative include:
• Improvement in employee satisfaction scores of management support/clarity of roles.
In addition to these measures, surveys could be utilized for impacted staff during the transition to
identify and address any issues or concerns.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: This initiative is not expected to result in direct cost savings but is expected to result in
benefits to DFA’s customers through improved quality and accuracy of work performed by DFA staff and
improvements to the customer experience such as reduced wait times.
Change Management Plan: Clear communication with staff about the purpose for the changes should
accompany any information on the new process changes. Recommended messaging and modalities are
included for each audience in Figure 6. Key activities and timing for communication plan are included in
Appendix A – DFA Work Plan.
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
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Figure 6 – DFA-0 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• DFA is adding some new staff • Town hall. • Secretary Hudson
Staff impacted by positions as a result of Arkansas • Face-to-Face • Impacted division
changes Forward. We are investing in team leads
our team as a strategy to help meetings with • Communication
us better serve our customers. leadership, Director
• Detailed description of changes, future • Internal
including specific changes for manager, and Communications
every team impacted by the former resource
reorganization. Everyone manager.
continues to have a
place on the team.
• These changes are to strengthen • Town hall. • Communication
Other DFA staff our team, support collaboration, Director
• All staff
and enable more efficient email. • Internal
decision-making. Communications
• High level summary of resource
changes.
How this Department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective future
department
DFA has identified organizational changes to drive an efficient and effective organization. Continued
involvement by the Assistant Administrative Services Administrator and Arkansas Forward Project
Manager will be a key enabling factor to support the execution of the proposed organization changes.
In addition, DFA has identified critical staffing investments to help the department execute on its
mission. While all of these investments are important, two in particular will help execution of Arkansas
Forward initiatives and help with the organization’s effectiveness and efficiency including an internal
communication lead and project management support for the key Arkansas Forward and other
customer experience projects.
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward
Implementation
DFA leadership generated nearly 40 ideas to improve the departmental effectiveness and efficiency,
before prioritizing 12 initiatives for immediate implementation as part of Arkansas Forward that
collectively focus on improving customer and staff experience.
In 2022, McKinsey & Company completed a “State-of-the-States” survey providing a comprehensive,
nation-wide evaluation of resident customer experience with state government services in the United
States. The study included approximately 80,000 responses across all 50 states across 21 services
including public benefits (i.e., Medicaid, mental health services, employment benefits), licensing
permitting and registration (ex. Taxes, vehicle services, affordable housing services), and direct services
(ex. transportation, medical services). Findings from this survey highlighted the importance of customer
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
10
experience (CX) in resident satisfaction, particularly in the areas under DFA authority such vehicle
services and taxes, which ranked 1st and 2nd in terms of importance to Arkansas residents.
This study also found that compared to other Arkansas state services, satisfaction with vehicle and tax
services is at and below average, respectively. However, the survey also highlighted that satisfaction
with Arkansas vehicle and tax services is higher than peer states. Arkansas was found to have the
opportunity to follow leading states in shifting compliance to a "help taxpayers get it right" mindset.
Critically, the McKinsey study found that “reliability and consistency” were the most important drivers of
resident satisfaction in Arkansas for tax and vehicle services, above ease of navigation, provision of clear
and useful information, rapid response times, and courteousness of staff.1
As a result of this survey and the findings related to Arkansas, particularly in the areas of tax and vehicle
services, many opportunities to improve CX and therefore increase resident satisfaction were identified.
Addressing these initiatives cannot only improve CX, but also increase the effectiveness and efficiency of
these DFA functions.
Strategy: Improve Online Customer Experience
Initiatives to improve customer self-service online have been prioritized not only to support Arkansans
who prefer to engage with state government through this method, but also to improve the experience
of those who prefer in-person engagement by reducing lines and wait times through the shifting of
some transactions online. These initiatives seek to create easy-to-use resources, with correct and up-to-
date information, that offer comparable experience to in-office service delivery.
Initiatives part of this strategy include:
• Revamp DFA website to make it easier for public to access helpful information (DFA-9);
• Map and enhance DMV processes and technology to improve speed and service (DFA-8); and,
This initiative includes multiple additional in-process projects related to improving operations:
o Mobile Driver License
o Reduce/eliminate friction in vehicle registration process related to assessment and payment
of personal property taxes
o Revisit digital titling process)
• Implement Government Services Portal (Single Sign-On Portal) for full access to all DFA services
(and other departments) (DFA-14).
Discussion of three Arkansas Forward initiatives (DFA-9, DFA-8, and DFA-14 follows).
1
Source: McKinsey & Company 2022 “State-of-the-States.”
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
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Update DFA website to increase customer satisfaction and increase efficiency–Initiative
DFA #9
This initiative recommends updating and marketing the DFA website to make answers to citizens'
questions more easily and readily available and establish the 1) appropriate communication channels
(e.g. socials, website), 2) cadence, 3) format, and 4) content to most effectively convey tax expectations
and other relevant content to citizens.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Implementing, expanding, and improving services through
the use of technology and online platforms is one method by which DFA is working to improve its
customer satisfaction. Updating its website is a key strategy to support citizens and increase self-service.
In 2017, DFA undertook a comprehensive effort to increase technology efficiencies and move driver and
motor vehicle services online through a new website “MY DMV,” enabling Arkansas drivers to do online
what had previously needed to complete in-person at a revenue office. The initiative was highly
successful, not only for DFA, reducing foot traffic and encouraging use of the website, but for other
public agencies as well. As a prerequisite to renewing a vehicle registration online, a citizen must have
assessed their personal property for the year and paid property taxes. DFA’s website redesign
streamlined online renewals for vehicle registration, while expanding dialog between DFA and County
Assessors and Collectors. As a result of the success of this effort, including the effective promotion of the
initiative, DFA received an award in 2019 from NASCIO, the National Association of State Chief
Information Officers.2 For context from September 1, 2023 – September 1, 2024, the top six
MyDmv/Online transactions included:
• Online Title and Registration-18,934
• Pay account balance-24,366
• Duplicate License-14,240
• Change of address-11,753
• License/ID Pre-Registration-15,029
• ARSTAR-765,485
More recently, to enhance customer experience for residents utilizing DFA services, the department has
undertaken a new effort to expand the success of MY DMV through improvement of its main website
(https://www.dfa.arkansas.gov/). The purpose of this project is to improve navigation and ease of use of
the site, create a simple interface, correct and update existing content and remove obsolete
information, expand self-service functionality for citizens through addition of features such as a chat
bot, which are anticipated to result in a positive workload impact on DFA operations, and ensure the
website experience matches the in-person experience in terms of offering great service. The new page
will be launched in August 2024, with a second wave of the project that will focus on improved content
for the other state departments DFA serves, estimated for completion by December 2024.
2 NAISCO State IT Recognition Awards, 2019, “My DMV, Digital Government - Government to Citizen,”
https://www.nascio.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/NASCIO-Award-Submission-MyDMV-DRAFT.pdf.
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
12
The process to redesign the page has been data-driven and collaborative, including:
• Department staff reviewed current website analytics to determine the top visited pages and
services (including seasonal changes during tax season to inform the layout of the redesigned
DFA website), to enable the most popular services to be made more prominent and easily
accessible;
• DFA division leaders provided insight on pain points with the existing website and any steps that
could simply or streamline processes for customers and employees;
• The Communication Team, Legal staff, and DFA division leaders reviewed website content for
updates and to identify obsolete content for removal;
• The project team and external vendor, Tyler Technology, also collected feedback from Secretary
Hudson; and,
• Common questions and requests for information were analyzed to inform the development of
the chat bot and related content library.
Rationale: The updated DFA website is a critical strategy in the department’s drive to become a best-in-
class service department for residents of Arkansas, by engaging the public and improving customer
experience. In addition, through the scheduled website updates, DFA and the State of Arkansas have the
potential to reduce operational costs and increase revenue collections through the augmentation of
digital transactions.
Initiative DFA-9 directs the department to continue to invest in its updated website, with a focus on
completing implementation of August Wave 1 release, planning for December Wave 2 phase, and
creating a marketing plan to rollout new site and increase adoption. While DFA has made significant
progress in its website redesign, there are some outstanding steps to most effectively implement the
new website, particularly in scoping and planning for Wave 2 of the project.
For the August launch (Wave 1), there remains a need to develop and implement a marketing campaign
that can drive residents to its updated website to maximize the investment it has made in improving
customer and employee experience. This recommendation is based on the success of DFA’s campaign to
promote its new website in 2017. DFA, in partnership with the Information Network of Arkansas (INA),
launched the “Skip the Trip” public awareness campaign that leveraged social media, ads, print
communications, homepage callouts, trade show displays, and media relations. Representatives from
DFA attended county fairs and worked with INA to produce marketing swag, business cards, flyers, and
pop-ups to catch attendees’ attention.
For the Wave 2 launch, because DFA is in the initial planning stages, the project team will need to scope
the project, work with division leaders to gather requirements, and develop and implement the project
plan.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – DFA Work Plan provides the action steps in the
recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation
process identified through interviews and work sessions with DFA staff and review of other state best
practices include:
Figure 7, below, showcases some peer states that have enhanced their online state services, including
what services are now offered and, where available, early outcomes of the roll-out.
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
13
Figure 7 – Best Practices in State Online Service Rollout
State Services Offered via Website Enhancement Outcomes
Montana ● Example of state with recent DMV website ● Not yet available
Credentialing improvements, 18 other states use Fast system
and adopted in Montana
Registration ● Sample of online functions:
System o Replace/renew licenses
(CARS) o Change addresses
o Pay reinstatement fees
o Access driver histories
o Start applications for driver’s tests online (test
still in person, reduces appointment length)
Oregon ● Example of state with DMV improvements to website ● Adoption rate - 1M
License ● Sample of online functions: transactions
Issuance and o Renew registration/Replace registration card processed annually
Vehicle o Get, renew, replace ID card ● Efficiencies gained -
Registration o Replace/transfer plates 58% auto-approved
(OLIVR) o Requesting driver and vehicle histories ● 2023 data breach
o Purchase Sno-Park permit
Texas.gov ● Example of 20 years of investment in website to ● 14+ million
continually expand functionality and streamline transactions/year
customer experience ● Generated estimate of
● Sample of online functions: $26M in revenue in
● Moved to “digital first” approach to service, 2020 (estimate)
created TxT Digital Assistant which allows user to ● High customer
create one account to engage multiple state satisfaction: 2018-
agencies 2020 data show 91% of
● Top services: access vital records, apply/renewal respondents strongly
handgun license, apply/renewal vehicle agreed/agreed they
registration, renew/replace driver’s license, would recommend
request license driver records, complete online service to
commissary purchase/deposit someone and 89%
● Full list of online services: strongly agreed or
https://www.texas.gov/government-services- agreed they were overall
directory/ satisfied with
experience
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Establishing an ongoing process to review and update website content (including the library the
chatbot utilizes) is critical to ensuring the reliability and consistency of information. The 2022
McKinsey “State-of-the-States” survey found that “reliability and consistency” were the most
important drivers of resident satisfaction in Arkansas for tax and vehicle services, above ease of
navigation, provision of clear and useful information, rapid response time, and courteousness of
staff. There is a need to establish a centralized process to document that divisions review their
assigned pages on a regular basis (i.e., annually or semi- annually) and to track that updates
have been made. One of the advantages of Wave 1 is that
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14
DFA will be implementing a new website content management system, which should enable
these changes to be made more easily and by internal DFA staff.
• Investing in a campaign to drive website utilization will be important for DFA to realize its return
on investment for the website project. There is a need to collect user feedback (could be done
through a short survey on the page, stakeholder interviews, and data analysis among other
methods) and analyze the site’s performance continuously (monitoring for broken links, identify
page traffic, monitoring online transactions) to identify opportunities for improvement and to
mitigate the risk of user adoption challenges.
Recommended steps to implement a new website with tax information (future state): Many
recommended steps identified for this initiative have already been undertaken and/or completed by
DFA at time of report release. These are indicated with an (*).
Wave 1 (planned for August 2024)
• Conduct a needs assessment, define project scope and objectives, identify key stakeholders, and
develop a detailed project plan and timeline.*
• Hold meetings with impacted staff/stakeholders to gather input and feedback for the new
design and establish ongoing communication channels.*
• Update wireframes and prototypes for the improved site navigation, enhance search
functionality and ensure mobile responsiveness.*
• Preview and receive approval from Secretary and broader DFA leadership team on
improvements.*
• Draft, review, and develop new content and translate content into multiple languages if
necessary.*
• Integrate the new website design with existing DFA systems, ensure seamless data flow, and
implement necessary security measures to protect user data.
• Conduct comprehensive usability testing with a wide range of users, identify and fix any bugs or
issues, and ensure the site meets accessibility standards.
• Communication department should build targeted marketing plan:
o Establish key performance indicators to measure the outcome of the marketing
campaign (website traffic, including for key pages; number of successful transactions
performed).
o Continue use of Google Analytics to analyze website traffic and successful transactions
performed.
o Revisit successful marketing and outreach strategies from 2017 MyDMV rollout.
o Consider partnering with other departments or public entities that will benefit from DFA
online service enhancements to encourage adoption of online services.
• Officially launch the updated website.
• Execute marketing plan.
• Conduct return on investment analysis for Wave 1.
Wave 2 (Estimated to be December 31, 2024)
• Project team should complete collection of requirements.
• Engage architecture review board to approve final website.
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15
• Integrate the new website design with existing DFA systems, ensure seamless data flow, and
implement necessary security measures to protect user data.
• Conduct comprehensive usability testing with a diverse group of users, identify and fix any bugs
or issues, and ensure the site meets accessibility standards.
• Preview and receive approval from Secretary and broader DFA leadership team on
improvements.
• Develop any additional communications required to outreach to other state agencies.
• Officially launch the second wave of website improvements.
• Execute marketing plan.
• Conduct return on investment analysis for Wave 2.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Enhancing customer experience
for taxpayers is a high priority of the Department, as are making DFA a premier workplace in the state of
Arkansas and improving revenue collections for the state. Implementing and promoting the successful
adoption of an updated website that can increase online traffic, reduce in-office visits, and increase
resident and employee satisfaction is aligned with agency priorities. The Communication and
Information Technology Teams at DFA have sufficient staffing resources to design the revised website.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial estimates by DFA indicate that a
website development contractor and IT infrastructure support are required for this initiative, as is
funding for a marketing budget request. DFA has already secured the IT resources for Wave 1 but an
estimated $10,000 is needed for the marketing campaign as identified by DFA. Wave 2 will require
similar IT support costs. It is anticipated that despite these upfront costs, this initiative has the potential
recurring financial impact of approximately $3.8 million.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: DFA will need to
establish policies and procedures to implement a regular process for website content review to ensure
the content remains up to date. This could be managed centrally the enhanced DFA website (e.g.,
established the chatbot library and incorporate a digital workflow for any new functions not previously
available through the website).
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected impacts of this
initiative are to improve customer satisfaction and increase online service utilization and collections.
Recommended performance measures include:
• Increased number of people who have used DFA online services;
• Reduced in-person visits to DFA offices to conduct business;
• Improved customer service quality measured through increased website traffic, decreased
number of phone calls, and faster citizen response times;
• Improved employee satisfaction;
• Improved user satisfaction;
• Increased revenue collections across divisions with online transactions (i.e., in tax and
vehicle services); and,
• Increased compliance with other state and local government entities.
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Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: No savings were identified for this initiative but to the extent that utilization of the
website increases substantially, this could result in revenue generation or create cost avoidance due to
reduced operational costs.
Change Management Plan: DFA will achieve the expected return on investment if the public is able to
navigate to the website and complete transactions online. A comprehensive communication plan,
including a marketing plan, is recommended to support this effort. Communication tasks are included in
Attachment A – DFA Work Plan and summarized in Figure 8 below.
Figure 8 – DFA-9 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
● Internal ● Website ● Face-to-face meetings with ● Jyothi Prasad
staff enhancements will department leadership ● Tamika Heard
● Client- improve not only ● Face-to-face meetings with ● DFA
facing staff customer experience, division leadership, including Communications
but will improve district offices Team/Marketing
employees’ ability to ● Town-hall style meetings Team
conduct their job with agency staff
● Trainings for staff will ● Agency-wide emails
aid in adaptation and ● Agency trainings on new
uptake of new website website offerings, how to
offerings utilize
● Fliers in DFA offices
Arkansans ● Residents can save ● Social media outreach ● Jyothi Prasad
time and receive ● Media outreach ● Tamika Heard
reliable, consistent ● DFA
service by accessing Communications
services online Team/Marketing
Team
Map and enhance DMV processes with technology to improve speed and service -
Initiative DFA #8
This initiative directs DFA to map current DMV processes to identify areas for improvement that could
be bolstered by targeted technology investments (e.g., appointment scheduling tool) and then deploy
those improvements with the goal of reducing DMV process times and increasing quality of DMV service
to Arkansans. Note: This initiative is related to Initiative DFA-18 that looks to improve DFA processes
across functions (but not limited to improvements through technology).
This initiative has been defined as an overarching strategy that also includes the following three in-
process improvements for the DMV driven by DFA leadership:
• Mobile Driver’s License – DFA is launching a digital representation of the information contained
on a physical driver’s license or state identification card (completion expected by February
2025);
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• Vehicle Registration Process improvements – DFA is working to reduce/eliminate friction in
vehicle registration process related to assessment and payment of personal property taxes; and,
• Revisit digital titling process – DFA is looking for efficiencies in the titling process, including
digitization.
• Appointment scheduling and document uploading – DFA seeks to offer citizens greater
convenience and improve processes through digitization.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DFA divisions collaborate to perform multiple statutorily
required DMV functions including but not limited to:
• Issuing and renewing (as applicable) driver’s and commercial driver’s licenses;
• Issuing license plates, titles, and vehicle registrations; and,
• Administering driving and commercial driving tests and issuing results.
DMV leadership and staff stated their goal is to deliver these functions with exceptional customer
service. DMV offers these services through its “My DMV” website and in-person offices (located within
DFA’s state revenue offices (SROs) and embedded within county court buildings. Figure 9 provides a
Supplies, Inputs, Processes, Outputs, and Customers (SIPOC) diagram for the DMV processes as
developed with division leadership and staff.
Figure 9 – Suppliers, Inputs, Processes, Outputs, and Customers (SIPOC) Diagram
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
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Regardless of what output a citizen seeks from DMV, the high-level process is similar, and summarized in
Figure 10: the Arkansan initiates the task, provides document and payment, and DFA issues the
requested documentation.
Figure 10 – High-Level Current DMV Workflow
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
To complete these functions, there are multiple steps that occur between the front-office staff who
interface with the public (DMV) and the back-office staff who validate the information, index
documents, and check for potential fraud (DSMV staff). A more detailed process map is shown in Figure
11.
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Figure 11 – DMV/SRO Workflow
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
Observations about the current state include:
• “My DMV” offers full functionality of offices; certain segments of the population may be
unaware of or unwilling to use the website. Other factors such as limited internet access may
limit use in rural areas.
• The efficiency of the in-person workflow is compromised if customers do not bring all the
required documents. Customers may have to make multiple trips if they do not bring sufficient
documents, which causes dissatisfaction for customers, delays completion of their task, and
creates additional operational strain for DFA.
• There are multiple internal delays in the process because the process is not automated fully. For
example, at the end of each day, physical documents are mailed by the SROs to central office,
where the documents are indexed and reviewed for authenticity before the customer can be
issued the requested item. Use of scanning has been incorporated for Driver’s Services, but
other functions do not use this option to expedite processing.
• There are certain wet signature and other statutory requirements which impact digitization of
the process.
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Some additional barriers to DFA in delivering exceptional service as identified by staff are shown in an
interference diagram in Figure 12. The red boxes represent barriers to delivering the goal of exceptional
service in the DMV process and the green boxes represent solutions, which are considered in the
implementation plan.
Figure 12 – DMV/SRO Interference Diagram
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
Rationale: Through process mapping and analysis, the DFA team can identify ongoing opportunities for
improvement, to enhance the DMV experience for citizens, in addition to the multiple technology-
enabled projects already identified.
Process improvement suggestions identified by the team are shown in green in Figure 12 above. These
solutions range from investing in the team (dedicated training staff) providing growth and advancement
opportunities, hiring at higher position grades), to using technology to find fraud. Most of these
improvements would not result in changes to the current state process map. One of the most significant
process improvements will be to offer citizens the option to schedule appointments and upload
documentation. Once introduced, these improvements may result in process changes or allow
individuals to move through the existing process more quickly. In addition, a suggestion that would alter
the existing process is to create a triage process, whereby citizens would check in with their documents
before going into the wait queue for an appointment. If they did not have all documents required, they
could receive guidance on what is needed and could return with the
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documents. They would not have to wait the full duration to see a representative, to be turned away.
This suggestion is shown on the future state process map in Figure 13, in green.
Figure 13 – DMV/SRO Future State Process Map
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in July 2024.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – DFA Work Plan – provides the action steps in the
recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation
process identified through interviews and work sessions with DFA staff and review of other state best
practices include:
Other states have continued to invest in digitization and technology improvement of DMV operations,
including:
• Many states have sought to make their DMV transactions available online, like Arkansas, either
building proprietary systems or purchasing them. For example, Montana and 18 other states
implemented the Credentialing and Registration System (Fast Enterprises software), which
allows for replacement/renewal of licenses, address change, pay fees, and access
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
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drivers history. Montana also deployed online appointment scheduling and plans to include title
registration in the future. Montana has seen process efficiencies.3
• The American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators published a comprehensive 2017
best practice guide after convening a workgroup of states and industry partners: “System
Modernization Best Practices.”4
• Arizona: Arizona was the first adopter of online driver’s services “ServiceArizona.com” but its
20-year-old solution has become dated. Arizona recently upgraded its system to “Arizona MVD
Now,” a cloud-based solution. The model is also unique in the funding model used; it was a
“claw-back” or benefit-based funding models that did not require a state appropriation.5
• Texas: Like Arizona, while Texas has driven many changes through “MyTexas.Gov” successfully,
the state is now turning to modernizing its DMV. Texas plans to upgrade the state’s Registration
and Titling System (RTS), which was implemented in the 1990s and is working on obtaining the
legislative appropriation to move forward.6
• Oregon: The Oregon Driver and Motor Vehicle Services (DMV) implemented an overhaul of its
core system, which was nearly 100 years old. In addition, Oregon deployed OLIVR (Oregon
License Issuance and Vehicle Registration). Functions include renewal of licenses online, as well
as making payments, and purchasing permits. The state accepts electronic signatures and have
seen improvements in paperwork reductions. The state plans to create self-service kiosks and
add online exams. Consumer adoption of technology has gone as intended.7
• New York: New York’s experience offers some guidance into challenges that could be faced
around digitization and fraud. One of the state’s early tests to use online permitting experienced
fraud, requiring rethinking of the approach. The state is moving forward with other customer
experience technology solutions such as use of e-signature tools, implementing chatbots and
voice automation technologies, and creating a unified state ID (NY.govID+).8
• Nebraska: Nebraska purchased an “off the shelf” DMV solution. The state funded creation of an
on-premises computing environment, hosted in the state’s primary enterprise data center and
backed-up in a second data center. A number of the best practices cited in the
3 Statescoop, “Montana’s motor vehicles division is going digital,” November 3, 2023,
https://statescoop.com/montana-motor-vehicle-division-digital-driver-services-system.
4 American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators, “System Modernization Best Practices,” May 2017,
https://www.aamva.org/assets/best-practices,-guides,-standards,-manuals,-whitepapers/system-
modernization-best-practices.
5 ADOT, “Arizona MVD engages citizens and delivers value with the cloud,” December 9, 2020,
https://customers.microsoft.com/en-us/story/856405-arizona-department-of-transportation-governement-
azure-en-united-states.
6 Government Technology, “Is There Hope for Modernizing State DMVs?” March 2023,
https://www.govtech.com/computing/is-there-hope-for-modernizing-state-dmvs.
7 Government Technology, March 2023.
8 Government Technology, March 2023.
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
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AAMDV publication turned out to be critical to Nebraska’s success including: 1) investing in data
cleansing, 2) involving stakeholders, 3) using a vendor and state technology teams.9
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Continue to obtain citizen and stakeholder feedback to inform future improvements.
• Invest in communication plan to promote the new functionality developed, whether that is
process improvement or technology enabled (such as the digital driver’s license). It is important
for citizens to understand how to use the new tools to increase their adoption and help the state
realize the return on investment.
Recommended steps to implement DMV improvements (future state):
There are many inflight projects related to DMV improvements. This project plan focuses on
implementing some of the staff-generated ideas for improvement:
• Create a staff committee with representatives from the DMV/DSMV/SRO teams of all levels
(frontline staff and management). These staff should be champions for change and can be part
of the change management and communication strategy.
• Consider if it would be beneficial to conduct additional mapping at county offices to identify
variations in county practices. If there is lack of adherence to the central process, there could be
additional training initiatives developed to address variation.
• Review and prioritize staff improvement ideas identified in the facilitated session.
• Develop a plan to implement the selected initiatives.
• For the triage initiative:
o Connect with counterparts in Texas to study implementation of the triage process used
there.
o Develop procedure and staff training materials for the pilot.
o Identify metrics to use to measure success (i.e., the number of people turned away who
have incomplete documents, satisfaction rate, and wait time).
o Identify pilot offices where the solution can be implemented (suggest in at least two
counties).
o Pilot the triage concept for a set time period (suggest 60-90 days).
o Assess the impact of the pilot and make the decision to expand (Secretary Hudson and
Division leadership).
o Make adjustments to the pilot design based on the experience of staff.
o Expand pilot to statewide initiative.
o Develop communication plan for statewide rollout.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Improvements to the DMV are
highly valued by the public and directly impact their views of DFA and state government. Leadership at
DFA and within the Revenue division have already prioritized citizen experience as the top priority for
the department and have committed to driving a culture change within the organization to achieve this.
As noted above the 2022 McKinsey & Company “State-of-the-States”
9
State Tech, “DMV Modernization Initiatives Deliver Big Benefits for Citizens,” April 8, 2020,
https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2020/04/dmv-modernization-initiatives-deliver-big-benefits-citizens.
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
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survey, established a strong link between customer experience and resident satisfaction and illustrated
that customer experience improvements can have tremendous benefits for government agencies and
their staff and stakeholders.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: DFA staff valued training and other
investments in its operations such as implementation of a triage process, but given existing workload,
did not think these initiatives could be accomplished without dedicated staff serving in this capacity. If
staff are diverted from current operations, in the short term, that could create capacity concerns. Over
time, these initiatives are expected to reduce workload and improve efficiency, which may make it
possible for the FTE count to be reduced, but in the short-term, DFA may consider making investments
in the staff infrastructure to make some of these improvements possible.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: With this
initiative, DFA’s intention is to commit to a more detailed process mapping to identify further areas
within the current “as is” workflow at a regional SRO offices, including the triage process identified by
our own initial mapping, so as to ensure the Pilot is successful in reducing wait time and enhancing the
customer experience through technology and a more efficient process. The triage process will have an
impact on the existing process flow in office transactions. While it is noted in the process diagram, a
more detailed workflow will need to be developed with the team for the pilot.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: This initiative, and when
including the other in-flight plans for DMV, should impact a variety of measures such as:
• In office wait time (reduce);
• Processing time (for transactions like issuing license) (reduce);
• Satisfaction (increase);
• Complaints (reduce);
• Number of visits (reduce, due to citizens needing fewer trips); and,
• Online transactions (various) (increase).
However, because some of these metrics are not readily measured, DFA leadership should consider in
investing in the definition and capture of these metrics to allow for collection of a baseline data so that
the result of these improvements can be quantified.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: Up to $10 million in potential positive fiscal impact has been identified with this
initiative over time (when considering the multiple DMV-related improvements that are part of
Secretary Hudson’s vision). This includes increased revenue generation from digital transactions, as well
as cost avoidance from some operational savings generated. However, there are some up-front
investments to realize this positive fiscal impact as noted.
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Change Management Plan: In several other states that have sought to modernize their DMVs,
managing the change and driving culture change toward customer centric practices was important.
These states found that implementing new technology solutions was not the only issue, they had to also
address the culture, leadership, and training.10 Multiple states such as Minnesota, Idaho, and Colorado
discussed the need to find the right leaders and to support the culture change that comes with process
improvement in the DMV. DFA has multiple initiatives focused on customer service as part of Arkansas
Forward. Collectively, these initiatives will be important in helping the department to manage the
culture change that goes along with the digitization.
Communication planning will be important to communicate any of the process improvements
implemented by the DMV. Depending on the initiatives developed, a communication plan will need to
be developed that explains new functionality to relevant public, legislative, DFA and other audiences
using appropriate channels (website, press release, email, social media, and other).
Create a single sign-on licensing portal with direct document upload - Initiative
DFA #14
This initiative is to create a single sign-on portal with features that enable direct documentation upload
to minimize paperwork and streamline and automate application review. The intent for this portal is to
allow the user to have a personalized account where they can initiate and access online government
services. Future functionality, such as the digital driver’s license, would be accessible within the portal.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Since 2017, DFA has worked to expand citizen self- service
online. DFA’s current vision is to move from discrete functions to a single sign-on portal, where all
functions can be accessed through one log-on. This solution is modelled after portals used in industries
such as banking and would make Arkansas the first state in the nation to implement this solution in state
government. This project is one of DFA’s highest priorities, and DFA requested its inclusion in Arkansas
Forward.
DFA scoped this project to focus initially on motor vehicle services, taxpayer access points, and child
support and a glidepath to expansion could add hunting and fishing licenses, voter registration,
immunization, and county tax assessor functions. DFA drafted a Request for Information (RFI) in 2024 to
solicit information from qualified contractors to develop, test, and implement the Government Services
Portal that may use the mobile driver’s license app for online identity authentication while using state
online services. Responsibilities will include managing, supporting, overseeing the enrollment of the
overall Government Services Portal Solution, and establishing standards and requirements for Arkansas
state departments and other entities that want to engage with the Government Service Portal program.
Rationale: DFA’s proposal has significant potential to improve citizen experience. Citizens would be
able to engage with applicable government services, creation of a single user identity “vault”
10 Statescoop, “Why is it so hard for DMVs to upgrade their technology?” April 21, 2020,
https://statescoop.com/it-modernization-why-so-hard-dmv-upgrade-technology/.
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would streamline application for numerous services, and dashboard functionality would provide much
greater visibility and transparency to the user about the status of services.
Implementation Considerations: DFA is ready to develop this solution and views it as an essential
next step in the evolution of its customer self-service tools. DFA has been working with the Department
of Transformation and Shared Services (TSS) in the implementation of this project and ongoing
collaboration will be important to its success.
Appendix A – DFA Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with DFA staff. Because DFA is a leader in the development of this
solution, there are not many other state examples to look to for guidance at this time.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• DFA and TSS executive leadership is engaged in this project currently, which will be important to
ensure both departments continue to prioritize its implementation.
• Because this type of innovation has not been tried and tested in Arkansas, DFA should engage
the vendor community through an RFI, which will inform the evolution of the project.
Recommended steps to implement single service portal (future state): A detailed project plan and
project manager will be required to manage this process. DFA has already secured its project manager,
and a project plan should be developed to issue the RFI. Should DFA move forward with this project
after the RFI, a more detailed timeline should be issued for the RFP process and implementation. Some
considerations for development of the RFI include:
• Project management resources at DFA and TSS;
• Project governance structure;
• Funding source (assumed to be DFA); and,
• Desired timeline for the project (to align with funding availability).
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative remains one of the
top priorities for DFA, and its resources have already been aligned to support its execution. For example,
DFA has hired a project manager to oversee this project.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: The cost to implement the project have
not yet been determined because requirements gathering has not been completed. The intent of this
initiative is to result in the issuing of an RFI, which will help to scope the project.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: This online
offering is in addition to the in-office processes maintained across DFA’s divisions. The RFI would have
solicited information from qualified contractors to develop, test, and implement the Government
Services Portal that may use the mobile driver’s license app for online identity authentication while
using state online services. Responsibilities identified in the RFI that would include process changes
included managing, supporting, and overseeing the enrollment of the overall Government Services
Portal solution, and establishing standards and requirements for Arkansas state departments and other
entities that want to engage with the Government Services Portal program.
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Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The primary indicator this
initiative would seek to improve is citizen satisfaction/net promoter score with DFA (expected to
increase). There could be benefits realized across divisions as more transactions occur online, which
could reduce processing time for various transactions.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: Approximately $150,000 in recurring positive fiscal impact were identified as a result of
this project (combination of revenue generation and cost avoidance). This portal it will make it easier for
citizens to do business with the state without having to come to the DMV offices, without having to
contact DFA and take up considerable time and resources enhancing the citizen experience. This will all
lead to future cost avoidance that is undeterminable at this point and would be in addition to the
recurring positive fiscal impact.
Change Management Plan: This project is not anticipated to result in significant change management,
but a robust communication plan will be needed to promote the new offering similar to “MyDMV.” See
Initiative DFA-9 for a discussion of communication costs around such campaigns.
Strategy: Customer Experience at SRO Initiatives
Initiatives to improve customer experience at State Revenue Offices (SROs) have been prioritized to
support Arkansans who prefer in-person engagement with DFA. Arkansas’ 133 SROs handle thousands of
transactions each day (i.e., in the collection of fees for driver services, motor vehicles, sales and use tax,
and real estate stamps) and remain the primary means by which citizens engage with DFA (over 4.0
million transactions in 2023 and 2.5 million in 2024 year-to-date). Intended improvements in SRO
operations include technology-enabled improvements as well as investments in staff training and
improved business processes.
Initiatives part of this strategy include five projects currently in process and two new initiatives:
• Refreshing credit card machines (in progress, with completion expected by 12/1/24);
• Reducing credit card swipe fees (complete as of 8/1/24), which will save taxpayers
approximately $2.7 million per year in fees;
• Creating an appointment system for SRO visits that allows for pre-visit document uploads;
(target completion by 1/1/25);
• Establishing CX standards at SROs and train staff to follow (target completion by 3/31/25) (DFA-
44);
• Identifying opportunities to streamline business processes by eliminating unnecessary steps and
automating to drive self-service (DFA-18);
• Developing standardized dashboard to track SRO wait times; and,
• Establishing standards for SRO office appearance/cleanliness/comfort.
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Train all DFA employees on customer experience standards - Initiative #44
This initiative establishes seeks to establish department-wide customer experience (CX) performance
standards and to train and train all DFA employees on these expectations, to reinforce the organization’s
focus towards becoming a more customer-focused organization and encourage high quality customer
service outcomes. This initiative is intended to be a “quick win” and deployed over the next six months.
Examples of customer service standards include politeness, accuracy, and for same day response.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DFA’s unique divisions serve many constituencies in
Arkansas. There are many in-person and telephonic touchpoints between citizens and DFA. Customer
service is “everyone’s job” but it is not measured and reinforced through staff training, among other
methods. Access to data on customer experience and satisfaction also varies by program. For example,
SRO leadership do not have a formalized report to track citizen complaints. Such data is a rich source of
potential process improvement and lack of access to this data can make it challenging for leaders to
identify issues and correct them.
Rationale: Initiative DFA-44 seeks to reinforce DFA’s culture of customer service and experience by
establishing expectations for the organization and training staff on these expectations. Investment in
customer service skills for staff can have a positive impact not only on the clients served but also result
in improved job performance and outcomes.
State and federal agencies have sought to model customer experience initiatives in the private sector by
establishing performance standards. For example, recently, the federal Health Care Financing
Administration (HCFA) established a customer service goal to improve the quality of information
provided to Medicaid/Medicare beneficiaries. The standards adopted included:11
• 95% of responses to written inquiries are accurate and issued within 30 days;
• Telephone inquiries are accurately and timely answered;
• 97.5% or more telephone calls are answered within 120 seconds;
• All Trunks Busy (ATB) level is 20% or less;
• All manual requirements for accuracy are met; and,
• 98% of all claims are processed within 60 days.
There are many examples of curricula for public and private entities that seek to improve soft skills and
customer service training. There are a plethora of vendors who have developed products, at various
price points (Alliance Training and Consulting, ICMA, Human Resources Institute.12
11 Office of Personnel Management “Customer Service Standards,” https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-
oversight/performance-management/reference-materials/historical/customer-service-standards/
https://www.learningeverest.com/the-importance-of-customer-service-training-an-overview/
12 Alliance, “Meeting Customer Service Challenges in the Public Sector,” https://alliancetac.com/customer-
service-training/onsite-course/meeting-customer-service-challenges-in-the-public-sector-course-outline Human
Resources Institute, “Customer Services Skills for Government Employees,”
https://www.federaltraining.com/courses/professional_development/Customer_Service_Skills_training.asp x
ICMA, “Outstanding Local Government Customer Service,” https://shop.learninglab.icma.org/products/9973492-
flg_olgcs.
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There are also examples of states that have developed customer service training for staff. For example,
the Tennessee - Department of Children’s Services implemented a GREAT Service (Greet, Relate, Exceed,
Affirm, Thank) curriculum for employees developed by the State Department of Human Services,
Strategic Learning Solutions division.13
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – DFA Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with DFA staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Must follow-through to make the customer service skills part of DFA’s culture and values. If
conducted as a one-time training exercise, staff will not adopt and exhibit these behaviors.
However, if display of these skills and adoption of these values truly becomes part of how DFA
does business, the department will realize the greatest value. More discussion of strategies to
do this are addressed under “Change Management.”
• Dedicated training resources would support integration of customer service into DFA’s culture
and values. The investment to create a training unit within the Revenue division is aligned with
this initiative.
Recommended steps to implement customer-centered training (future state):
• Form a customer service workgroup, with representation from all business areas and Enhancing
levels of the organization. This should include Human Resources and Communication resources.
• The workgroup to develop a proposed list of key values and behaviors to inform its customer
interactions (these can be customer service values).
• Identify related measures that can be used to assess DFA performance across divisions in these
areas.
o Consider implementation of a Net Promoter Score, which is an overall measure of
whether the clients served by DFA would recommend DFA to their friends and families.
• Based on the key values identified, develop or purchase training to reinforce these values. There
are many “off the shelf” customer service tools and curricula that may be purchased. DFA could
adopt a “Train the Trainer” model to contain costs.
• Create a comprehensive strategy to reinforce these new customer service values:
o Create ongoing email / staff intranet content about the values and skills.
o Create messages from DFA leadership reinforcing the values.
o Create a staff recognition program for excellent performance in the values.
o Send some physical object with the values to staff.
• Create a scorecard to use in sharing relevant metrics with staff. This could be a monthly or
quarterly scorecard.
13 https://files.dcs.tn.gov/training/DOHR/CFW1000P.pdf
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Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Customer experience is among
the department’s highest priorities and a focus of not only Arkansas Forward, but other initiatives as
well. The staffing investments in an internal communication resource and a training unit, support the
implementation of this initiative.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: A range of costs could be incurred
depending on how DFA seeks to deploy this training. Development of training to communicate desired
customer service behaviors to the staff can be done within existing resources, a curriculum could be
purchased, or training seminars could be facilitated by a leader. If DFA invests in a training unit within
the Revenue division as is contemplated in Initiative #0, it is assumed this investment will offset the cost
of implementing a customer service training program, however there could still be costs to purchase a
curriculum.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: This initiative
directly is not expected to change processes, but depending on how leaders seek to integrate these
values and behaviors into their work, future process improvement could occur.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected impacts of this
initiative are to improve customer service across customer-facing functions at DFA. Metrics that could
be used to measure this success include:
• Net Promoter Score – would you recommend DFA to your friends and family? This single
question could be incorporated as a survey post-transaction with DFA and captured in a variety
of methods (as a verbal question at the end of a call, a text-based survey, or on kiosks in SROs);
• Complaint rate (decrease);
• Improved first call resolution in call center;
• Turnaround time to response (regardless of method – call, email); and,
• Improved satisfaction rate (could implement “pulse” surveys at the end of transactions).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: This initiative is not anticipated to result in direct cost savings but is expected to result
in external benefits to Arkansans interacting with DFA staff. DFA could incur a nominal score cost to
purchase or develop training, but these costs could be reduced if DFA uses a “Train the Trainer”
approach and if a designated training unit is created as contemplated in Initiative #0.
Change Management Plan: Once DFA defines its customer service objectives and goals, and trains the
team accordingly, additional reinforcement will be necessary to achieve the intended outcomes. There
are many low or no-cost methods DFA can use to integrate its customer service goals into its culture and
operations, such as:
• Creating a dashboard to measure performance related to the values and using this dashboard in
management meetings on a persistent and ongoing basis with staff;
• Recognizing teams or individual staff members who embody the values in town halls, all staff
newsletters, and other forums;
• Incorporating these standards into the hiring process;
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• Incorporating these standards into the annual staff evaluation process; and,
• Providing staff with physical representations of them (signage in offices, mousepads, laminated
cards, lanyards).
These examples illustrate how organizations can make their values “come alive” and remain relevant for the
staff.
Key communication tasks are included in Attachment A – DFA Work Plan and summarized in Figure 14.
Figure 14 – DFA-25 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
All Staff • DFA is adopting new customer service • All staff emails.
values. • Town halls.
• Improving customer experience is our goal. • Intranet/Sharepoint.
• Customer service is everyone’s • Face-to-face meetings.
responsibility.
• These values were identified by a team of
staff.
• We are going to provide tools and training to
reinforce these values and skills.
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Map DFA processes, identify issues, and improve efficiency and satisfaction -
Initiative #18
This initiative seeks to map key processes within DFA and identify pain points and bottlenecks, then
implement process solutions and organizational changes that improve process times and customer
satisfaction for SRO and DMV. While this initiative focuses on SRO and DMV functions, to support
process improvement, process mapping was used with the following additional Revenue organization
areas to provide DFA with the tools to begin process improvement: Legal, Field Audit/Field Audit
Collections, all Tax areas, with additional focus on Excise Tax and Corporate Income Tax.
Initiative Overview and Current State: There are opportunities within the SRO, DMV, and DSMV
business processes to identify process improvements, not only in review of the central, official process
flow, but also in review of practice at the multiple county offices to identify issues with adherence to the
official process. Categories for consideration include: review of decision points and approvals (with the
goal to consolidate to improve process flow), identification of process steps where digitization would be
beneficial, and identification of bottlenecks.
To begin this work, a process map was developed with DFA staff and is shown in Figure 15.
Figure 15 – DMV/SRO Workflow
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
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Another issue that affects the customer experience with regard to DMV operations is that Arkansas
statute requires citizens to pay county personal property taxes (on vehicles) prior to vehicle registration.
If an individual visits an SRO/DMV location with the intent to register a vehicle, s/he is unable to
complete this transaction without paying any outstanding county property taxes. While approximately
half of states continue to tax vehicles as personal property (though the trend is toward elimination of
this tax), Arkansas is atypical in the manner of its tax collection, with most states choosing to collect this
tax at the point of sale. Of states that tax vehicles as personal property, Arkansas is at the lower end in
terms of the amount assessed.14
As noted in the introduction, other business processes were included in the scope of this item for the
purpose of modelling the process improvement identified for SRO/DMV for other areas. The tools and
process maps reflecting these work sessions are included in Figures 16 – 24.
Figure 16 – Legal Process Suppliers, Inputs, Processes, Outputs, and Customers Diagram
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
14 John S Kiernan, “Property Taxes by State, 2024,” February 20, 2024, https://wallethub.com/edu/states-with- the-
highest-and-lowest-property-taxes/11585.
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Figure 17 – Legal Process Map
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
Figure 18 – Field Audit Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, and Customers Diagram
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
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Figure 19 – Field Audit Process Map
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
Figure 20 – Excise Tax Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, and Customers Diagram
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
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Figure 21 – Corporate Income Tax Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, and Customers Diagram
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
Figure 22 – Corporate Income Tax Process Map
Source: Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
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Figure 23 – All Taxation Interference Diagram
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in July 2024 and updated with feedback in August 2024.
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Figure 24 – SRO/DMF Interference Diagram
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
Rationale: The purpose of this initiative is to review the business processes used by DFA staff to
identify opportunities for improvement using a variety of tools. Staff identified process inefficiencies and
challenges to delivery of excellent service including in an exercise summarized in the Interference
Diagram in Figure 25. This diagram shows the inefficiencies in red boxes, surrounding the goal of
delivering exceptional service in the blue box in the center of the diagram.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – DFA Work Plan provides the action steps in the
recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation
process identified through interviews and work sessions with DFA staff include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Continue to obtain citizen and stakeholder feedback to inform future improvements.
• Invest in communication plan to promote the new functionality developed. It is important for
citizens to understand how to use the new tools to increase their adoption and help the state
realize the return on investment.
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Recommended steps to implement DFA process improvements (future state):
• Create a staff committee with representatives from the impacted division/program of all levels
(frontline staff and management). These staff should be champions for change and can be part
of the change management and communication strategy.
• Consider if it would be beneficial to conduct additional mapping at county offices to identify
variations in county practices. If there is lack of adherence to the central process, there could be
additional training initiatives developed to address variation.
• Review and prioritize staff improvement ideas identified in the facilitated session.
• Develop a plan to implement the selected initiatives.
• For initiatives prioritized:
o Develop procedure and staff training materials for a pilot (which can be tested with offices
or team units, depending on the impacted program).
o Identify metrics to use to measure success.
o Identify pilot offices or units where the solution can be implemented (suggest in at least two
counties or units).
o Pilot the concept for a set time period (suggest 60-90 days).
o Assess the impact of the pilot and make the decision to expand (Secretary Hudson and
Division leadership).
o Make adjustments to the pilot design based on the experience of staff.
o Expand pilot to statewide initiative.
o Develop communication plan for statewide rollout.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Improvements to the DFA’s
processes across are highly valued by the public and directly impact their views of DFA and state
government. Leadership at DFA and within the Revenue division have already prioritized resident
experience as the top priority for the department and have committed to changes within the
organization to achieve this. As noted above the 2022 McKinsey & Company “State-of-the- States”
survey, established a strong link between customer experience and resident satisfaction and illustrated
that customer experience improvements can have tremendous benefits for government agencies and
their staff and stakeholders.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Process improvements are expected to
have an indeterminate positive impact on operating costs.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: With this
initiative, DFA’s intention is to commit to a more detailed process mapping to identify further areas
within the current “as is” workflow across SRO and DMV operations, but potentially other
divisions/program areas. When initiatives for improvement are identified, they will be assessed for
impact to existing business processes.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: Using DFA-8 as a guide,
performance metrics should be identified for each improvement area. These measures are instructive of
the types of measures that should be considered across other program areas as well. Examples include:
• In office wait time (reduce);
• Processing time (for transactions like issuing license) (reduce);
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• Satisfaction (increase);
• Complaints (reduce);
• Number of visits (reduce, due to citizens needing fewer trips); and,
• Online transactions (various) (increase).
However, because some of these metrics are not readily measured, DFA leadership should consider in
investing in the definition and capture of these metrics to allow for collection of a baseline data so that
the result of these improvements can be quantified.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: Up to $350,000 in potential positive fiscal impact have been identified with this
initiative over time by the department, based on its assessment of the impact other initiatives already in
flight. The positive impact includes both increased revenue generated and cost avoidance from
operational improvements.
Change Management Plan: As with DFA-8 and other initiatives noted, there will be change
management work related to implementing these intended process improvements. Obtaining staff
support for change is essential for long-term adherence to the intended changes, and ensuring staff
understand the “why” behind these changes is important for their buy-in. This initiative is a “win” for
DFA with its external stakeholders, as it demonstrates the department’s effort to become more
customer-focused and solution-oriented. Developing a strategy to tout the improvements will be
important for DFA in receiving credit for these investments. A communication plan will need to be
developed that explains new process to relevant public, legislative, DFA and other audiences using
appropriate channels (website, press release, email, social media, and other).
Figure 25 – DFA-25 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Public • DFA has invested in • Press release Scott Hardin
process improvements • Website updates Communication Lead
to make the experience
of doing business with
government better.
• Summary of
improvements
implemented [insert].
DFA Staff • DFA has invested in • All staff meetings Internal Communication
process improvements • Town halls Lead
to make the experience • Staff emails
of doing business with • Feature “champions” of
government better. change who have been
• These improvements involved in the workgroup
has been developed
with staff input
(highlight detail as
applicable).
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• Summary of
improvements
implemented [insert].
• We will provide
support and training
for any business areas
impacted.
Strategy: Improve Customer Experience with Tax Initiatives
Enforcing Arkansas’ taxation laws is a core DFA statutory responsibility and is essential to the operation
of its state government. The complexity of and negative perceptions around state taxation requirements
and collection inform not only how the public views DFA, but also state government. In response, DFA
has identified multiple initiatives to improve customer experience with DFA’s taxation function ranging
from technology solutions to process improvement, to investment in staff through training initiatives,
including:
• Implement dedicated electronic tax lien filing system;
• Develop analytics coupled with AI to target audits (DFA-45);
• Stand up dedicated call center (DFA-23);
• Developed auditor training protocols (DFA-11);
• Update sales and use tax rules;
• Identify opportunities to update sales, use, and income tax laws and rules to increase
clarity; and,
• Create more robust fraud detection unit.
Three of these initiatives are part of Arkansas Forward and are outlined here.
Assess opportunity for implementing data-driven audits - Initiative DFA #45
This initiative directs DFA to assess the opportunity from implementing data-driven audits with the goal
of increasing efficiency in achieving compliance in the current audit process through data-driven audit
selection and collections. This initiative supports the creation of standard processes for audit selection,
reduction in discretion in the selection process, and targeting of DFA’s Field Tax Audit resources toward
the most significant potential cases of fraud or underpayment.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DFA’s Field Tax Audit function is responsible for audits
related to all tax types, but primarily sales and income taxes. The average auditor completes 5-10 audits
per year depending on the scope. The Team is divided into four districts, with approximately 90 staff
who perform audits. Audits include taxpayer outreach, initiation of audits, and report review. A
dedicated Auditor Coordination Team handles reporting and assessments (that are not full-blown
audits).
Today, audit selection is a mostly manual process that includes referrals from a suspicious activity
reporting intake form on the DFA website, through staff identification of anomalies using reports, and
from internal referrals. Internal referrals are a significant share of these leads; auditors often uncover
issues for further investigation when reviewing documentation for other audits.
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Rationale: Some gaps with the current audit selection process include:
• Data are not readily available and the process to obtain and analyze it is time consuming. The
team can request reports from the Arkansas Integrated Revenue System (AIRS) through a
reporting team, but the team does not have access to real-time and user-friendly dashboards to
inform their audit selection. The team understands that other states may be using different AIRS
functionality.
• Data review is time consuming and complex. Auditors may be requesting multiple sets of data
(which tend to be very large) and comparing them to look for any discrepancies, a process that
must be repeated with regularity and across many different taxes. For example, the team
compares sales data from liquor distributors with returns from liquor stores to identify
discrepancies.
• This process introduces the potential for error and discretion. Reports provide data, but do not
easily identify where to focus. This requires staff analysis, which can be manual and can result in
missed opportunities. Further, it introduces discretion for auditors and management, which can
result in fairness concerns.
DFA wants to shift to an automated, data-driven approach for audit selection using more formalized
criteria. DFA could create criteria with corresponding scoring to apply to accounts, which would more
clearly identify accounts for audit, remove user discretion, and create a fairer audit process. There is an
expected time savings for auditors that could be redirected toward field work related to audit
completion instead of searching for which audits to complete.
Other federal and state examples offer some opportunity for Arkansas. Since 2011, the Internal Revenue
Services has used its Office of Compliance Analytics to conduct data mining to identify noncompliance,
fraud, identity theft, among other issues.15 Since then and across divisions, the IRS has expanded used
data analytics in multiple areas. For example, the Large Business and International Division uses data
analytics in its Corporate Compliance program to select corporations for audit. The National Coordinated
Investigations Unit uses data for criminal investigation.16
Some states have also introduced analytics into audit processes. For example, New Mexico Taxation and
Revenue, Audit and Compliance Division has established a Data Analytics and Analysis team within its,
responsible for building models for audit selection and fraud detection, among other purposes.17
15 Kimberly Houser, “The Use of Big Data Analytics by the IRS: What Tax Practitioners Need to Know,” Journal of
Taxation, Vol. 128, No. 2, 2018. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3120741.
16 Christopher M. Ferguson, JD, “The IRS’s Plans for Big Data,” October 2021, CPA Journal,
https://www.cpajournal.com/2021/10/26/the-irss-big-plans-for-big-data.
17 New Mexico Taxation and Revenue, Audit and Compliance Division,
https://www.tax.newmexico.gov/about-us/audit-and-compliance-division.
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Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – DFA Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with DFA staff include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• DFA may require a consultant team to design reports and build the scoring methodology to
identify audit selection. The department may not have access to internal data analytics
resources to support this project. Other State of Arkansas departments, such as Department of
Inspector General, have adopted use of data analytics in its Medicaid fraud control effort and
have established a team of internal resources as well as consultant support. This model could be
used by DFA to create this process.
Recommended steps to implement data-driven audits (future state):
• Identify internal data analytics resources and make decision whether to augment the team with
consultant support or use the internal team.
• Conduct review of current audit processes to identify where data analytics may generate
improvement.
• Meet with existing AIRS vendor and reporting team to explore whether additional functionality
is available (outside DFA’s existing contract).
• Make a decision whether to augment the current contract or go to RFP. Seek Secretary Hudson’s
approval.
o If selected, draft and manage RFP process for data analytics software and tools for audit
selection and revenue collections.
• Create new reporting tools/dashboards for staff.
• Establish staff work flows and process for audit selection enhanced by available data and
reporting.
• Train audit staff and related support staff on new process.
• Begin implementing use cases with specific sources of data and reporting.
• Continue implementation into other uses cases.
• Complete return on investment analysis.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative aligns with the
department’s core responsibilities around enforcement of the state’s taxation requirements. The
department devotes significant resources today toward completing audits; this initiative would focus
some staff around using data to improve the audit selection process (within existing FTE count), with the
intent the audits completed are targeted toward the most significant and substantial cases which can
increase collections. The staffing investments in Fraud Prevention as discussed in Initiative #0 would
support this initiative, leading to collaboration within each tax unit to identify and investigate potential
fraud.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: This initiative could result in contractor
costs (involved in the design of the program) and purchase of additional software, at a cost to be
determined. It is possible DFA could expand its existing ACIS contract.
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Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: The audit
selection process will change, requiring updates to work flows. Improvement of audit selection through
a more prescriptive and data-driven process will not likely change how audits are completed but should
free up auditor time from having to identify audit selection activities.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected impacts of this
initiative are to enhance the efficiency of audit selection and increase available time for auditors to
perform their audit duties. This should also reduce discretion and improve fairness of audit selection,
which could improve citizen satisfaction with the process. Long-term, this should increase recoveries.
Applicable measures include:
• Number of audits identified through data-driven process;
• Audit recoveries;
• Reduction in audit time; and,
• Accuracy of audit results.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: This initiative could result in a potential positive financial impact of up to $9 million in
recoveries/collections; when other departments such as DIG have implemented data analytics, such
efforts have been used to pay for the investments in staff and systems.
Change Management Plan: This initiative is an internal business process change. Affected staff would
need to be informed but the impact would be contained within Field Audit. Is not anticipated this would
require significant external communication. DFA could issue a press release after the successful
implementation to tout the effectiveness of the initiative.
Create response management system to decrease response times and increase
accuracy of information - Initiative DFA #23
This initiative recommends the assessment of issues with the current call response process at DFA by
mapping processes and interviewing employees to create a response management system made up of a
trained pool of individuals to provide consistent and quick solutions to callers.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Arkansas DFA call center serves as the focal point for
customers to resolve a plethora of different tax situations, mainly on the income side, although some
calls are received on Excise and Corporate tax as well. The call center is often fast-paced, with six
hundred calls per day during the peak time of the year. Despite the volume of calls received and
processed, DFA management indicate there is no “one-size-fits-all” approach to the calls they receive,
and they do not consider their function a true call center as each call received is unique and the
response needed is individualized. In addition, DFA processes emails and faxes from customers. Figure
26, below, demonstrates the current inputs, processes, and outputs of the current call center function.
The DFA call center number is managed by TSS using a Cisco routing and call center software solution
called Finesse. The physical call center is managed and staffed by DFA employees. TSS provides DFA with
daily and weekly reports that include the typical call center metrics, including call volume, call
abandoned rate, agent status, average handling time, and others, but these reports are not real time.
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DFA management staff indicate they would like improvements to the quality of the information
received, as well as consistency and reliability. Having more meaningful “real time” data, management
staff indicate, would give DFA a better sense as to quality of calls and actual work of the intake
counselors, and would enable better time management of employees. In addition, staff indicate that the
current system does not allow them to make updates to staff listings, for example, which means
information shared is often outdated. While CISCO Finesse has the capability to do many of the
functions DFA is interested in having access to, DFA currently must go through TSS and OIS to perform
certain functions.
Under the current configuration, DFA leadership is not able to collect feedback on user experience
following a call to the agency for assistance. Management are also not able monitor staff or supervisors
taking calls to measure their effectiveness, or to review what was said on a call to monitor performance.
Figure 28 below indicates the current work flow for calls to DFA for tax-related issues.
The DFA call center is also struggling with high turnover and effective new employee training. The DFA
call center leadership team does not feel they provide a comprehensive training program for their staff.
Their staff need to understand and have knowledge of a wide variety of tax codes and laws. Just
recently, they designed an in-house training manual and job guides, but believe the next level of
professional training is required to prepare their team for the demands of the job and slow down
attrition. There is a stated desire to improve customer experience training at the agency and make this
metric more of a focus at the agency for residents calling for help with tax issues.
Findings from the “State-of-the-States” 2022 survey highlight the importance of customer experience in
residence satisfaction, particularly in the areas under DFA authority such vehicle services and taxes, with
“reliability and consistency” found to be the most important drivers of resident satisfaction. As a result
of this study DFA staff have made it an agency priority to improve customer experience.
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Figure 26 – DFA Call Response Suppliers, Inputs, Processes, Outputs, Customers (SIPOC)
Diagram
Suppliers Inputs Processes Outputs Customers
· Staff · Triggering event or · Outgoing phone
· Cisco Finesse notice calls
· AIRS · Reach out to DFA · Notices
· ATAP (phone, email, mail, · Outcome:
· FAST fax, web notice, walk- Resolved
· Call or other in) issue/satisfied
communication · Routed to correct customer
(email, fax, mail) general area (or · Feedback
· Notice or triggering transferred) · Revenue receipt
requirement, payment · Assigned to proper · Refund payment
plan (through AIRS) staff · Cleared liens
· Research · Dismissing writ
account/engage · Audit
· Resolve
communication
· Follow-up work if
necessary
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
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Figure 27 – DFA Call Response Current State Value Stream
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
Rationale: Initiative DFA-23 directs the department to create a response management system to
decrease response times and increase accuracy of information. Because DFA is not operating this
function as a true call center today, it may be missing out on the opportunity to implement proven tools
in managing similar functions in the public and private sector. Implementation of this initiative has the
potential increase the department’s ability to effectively serve Arkansans with their tax- related issues in
three areas, which may improve the state’s ability to recover taxes:
• Improved access to real-time data to inform workforce management and quality performance.
• Implementation of a quality assurance program.
• Enhancement of more staff training.
Improved access to real-time data
Principles of call center management allow leaders to oversee daily call center operations, including
promoting a positive customer experience and satisfaction. Effective call center managers are
responsible for monitoring inbound calls, designing call flows, hiring and training staff, creating
schedules to match call volume, and tracking and forecasting performance metrics. The current
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reports received from TSS on a regular cadence could be missing other metrics than what are currently
provided to promote call center efficiency. Without the right strategies and technology, a call center will
not meet expectations and struggle to achieve performance metrics and ensure the best customer
experience.
TSS and DFA should develop protocols to enable DFA leadership to have access to real-time data to
inform workload management and monitor the quality and outcomes of the calls, including in user-
friendly dashboards that make the data more actionable. Staff currently cannot access data to inform
workload management functions (scheduling staff, monitoring queues to ensure callers are not waiting
excessively) and quality assurance functions (reviewing calls to determine if caller questions are resolved
effectively, staff is providing accurate information, and to inform training).
Real-time access to the call center software is essential for properly scheduling the DFA team to align
with call volume. Having more available staff at peak times would assist with staff success and retention.
Leaders need to consider proper scheduling and workflow balance to get more work done without
sacrificing quality. High call center attrition occurs when managers do not anticipate peak call volume,
staff capacity, and staff ability. Most call center software includes a workforce management solution,
and this should be unlocked and directly accessed by DFA call center leadership.
Effectively managing a call center also requires real-time access to the call center software solution and
the creation of a centralized dashboard to increase access across the DFA call center teams. A
centralized dashboard allows real-time decision-making for fast and easy access to call volume, wait
times, and handling times. TSS should work with DFA call center leadership to offer real-time reporting
on key metrics (but also reporting by unit and staff person), with industry standard metrics such as those
summarized in Figure 28.
Figure 28 – Example Call Center Metrics for Consideration for DFA Dashboard
Measure Purpose Typical Standard
Average handle time Measures the length of a call from start to finish. Varies by industry
Average speed to Measures the average time it takes for a call to be 30-60 seconds
answer answered by a live agent.
Abandonment rate Measures the percentage of calls that disconnect <3-5%
before being answered.
First call resolution Measures ability to resolve customer issues within the 70-85%, industry
first contact. leaders exceed 90%
Satisfaction Rate Measures customer experience and satisfaction with 90%
the call center (not department overall)
Source: Alex Doran, “12 Key Call Center Metrics & KPIs To Drive Better Performance,” 2/12/24,
https://www.nextiva.com/blog/call-center-metrics.html?v=2.
Access to this data will allow DFA leadership to establish goals/service levels for each metric and to
manage the performance of the call center. Because data are not currently available on these metrics
and down to each unit/staff member, a prerequisite item for success of this initiative is to establish
baseline performance before agreeing to a goal.
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Implementation of Quality Assurance Program
In addition, DFA should work with TSS to obtain a mechanism to listen to a sample of live or recorded
calls as part of establishing a quality assurance program. This functionality is not currently available. A
sampling methodology can be created (typically a monthly percentage of calls for each worker), as well
as a tool to score calls based on elements including customer service principles and accuracy of
information. Findings can be provided to managers for their staff, which can be used to engage
individual staff on their training and development and to develop tools for the entire workforce such as
videos, online tools, FAQs, and experiential learning. Additionally, a satisfaction survey (a post- question
survey call) could be implemented to obtain real-time feedback about the call.
Enhanced training
Today, the department does not have a dedicated training team focused on this function. Staff receive
training, but not the level leadership think are needed to deliver quality outcomes for callers. Data can
be used to generate topics of training for the entire team (to occur on an ongoing quarterly basis).
Managers/supervisors can use performance data to develop individualized training plans for staff (i.e., if
the quality assurance program showed one agent had ongoing issues in politeness, a soft skills training
could be provided).
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – DFA Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with DFA staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Hold regular feedback sessions with the call coordinator and accountants to ensure clarity and
address any issues promptly to address the risk of miscommunication leading to calls not being
properly directed.
• Provide ongoing support and incentives for adherence to the new protocols to address the risk
of inadequate adoption of the new process by the call coordinator.
Recommended steps to implement customer-centered training (future state):
• Coordinate with TSS DIS to gain real-time access to the call center performance data.
• Establish key list of metrics for use and set goals for target performance (i.e., average speed to
answer less than 30 seconds). Establishment of the goals should balance national industry
standards with historical performance.
• Create a centralized dashboard to display data (dashboards with drill down to team and agent).
Monitors can be established in team areas to allow visibility to the statistics, as well as used by
leadership.
• Develop a strategy to measure customer satisfaction (such as by implementing a one question
survey at the end of the call) and otherwise exploring other customer satisfaction survey options
(i.e., random sample of callers receive callback about experience, text-based surveys).
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• Incorporate available data into protocols for workforce management (i.e., staffing to ensure
metrics are achieved).
• Create a quality assurance program, making use of a sample of each agent’s recorded calls. This
is dependent on accessing recorded calls. This could be incorporated into manager’s duties to
listen to a percent of their team’s calls, or a separate unit could be created to focus only on
assessment of quality across the entire team. Create a simple scorecard to evaluate calls and
aggregate data by agent, unit, and broader division.
• Create ongoing staff training to address trends identified through a quality assurance program.
Utilize various training formats such as videos, online tools, FAQs, and experiential learning with
more experienced staff while developing training.
• Present proposals for quality assurance and training to Secretary Hudson and other DFA
leadership for final approval.
• Implement the new training and quality assurance protocols, scheduling process, closely
monitor process effectiveness, collect feedback from staff, and monitor employee performance.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Enhancing customer experience
for taxpayers is a high priority of the Department, as is making DFA a premier workplace in the state of
Arkansas. Implementing improvements to its call center including use of real-time dashboards,
implementation of more quality assurance activities, and improvements to workforce training and
performance are aligned with these priorities.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: An area of anticipated cost would be for
DFA to access the data it needs and build real-time dashboards to better manage its contact center. The
cost estimates vary depending on how DFA seeks to approach this. Other departments such as the
Department of Agriculture have used low-cost, web-based data visualization tools and handled
programming internally within existing resources. TSS DIS may have access to additional platforms to
support these activities.
Best practice would be to have dedicated quality and training staff; if these resources are unavailable,
DFA could implement quality and training activities and decentralize these functions to have
managers/supervisors take some of this on. Initial estimates by DFA indicate this initiative would have
no recurring costs or staffing needs, utilizing existing resources.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: DFA will need to
establish policies and procedures to collect and manage real-time data effectively, including for
workforce scheduling, quality assurance, and training.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected impacts of this
initiative are to improve workforce staffing deployment and training. Recommended performance
measures include:
• Improved customer satisfaction (from reduced wait, improved escalation and routing)
• Increased first call resolution
• Improved employee satisfaction
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Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: No potential savings were identified in relation to this initiative, however
implementation may enable future revenue collection for the state through improved tax collection.
Change Management Plan: This initiative will introduce more structure and a data-driven focus in
contact center operations, which will necessitate internal process changes. Affected staff would need to
be informed. Is not anticipated this would require significant external communication. The key change
management tasks are included in Appendix A – DFA Work Plan and the key communication tasks are
included in Figure 29.
Figure 29 – DFA-25 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Internal staff • Leadership are harnessing technology to • Town-hall style Katlyn
better schedule intake coordinators using meetings with agency Slabodnick
DFA
real-time data call center staff
managers
• Training will be provided to better serve • Agency-wide emails
customers and improve customer
experience • Fliers in DFA offices
• Better workforce deployment and
training has potential to improve
employee retention and satisfaction
TSS DIS • DFA leadership require real-time software Leadership meets with staff Katlyn
data access to improve agency functions from different agencies Slabodnick
• DFA can improve state tax revenue
collection with improved customer
experience
Implement customer-centered tax auditor training within the Division of Field
Audit at DFA to enhance cooperation - Initiative DFA# 11
This initiative focuses on the implementation of a training program for DFA Field Audit focused on
customer experience and has the potential to improve employee hiring, retention, and performance at
DFA.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The duties of the Division of Field Audit (“Field Audit”)
include conducting audits to determine compliance with Arkansas tax laws and collecting delinquent tax
debts and fees. According to agency staff, within the DFA Revenue Division there are roughly 200 staff,
with 150 tax auditors in the Division of Field Audit. Tax Auditors are trained once per year and when
they are newly hired, with a training session for one week. Approximately 125 tax auditors complete the
Field Audit training each year.
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Figure 30 provides a Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, and Customers (SIPOC) diagram for the Field
Audit function. This tool is used to summarize the current state.
Figure 30 – Field Audit Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, and Customers
Source: Prepared in a work session with DFA staff in June 2024.
Interviews with DFA staff highlighted the department’s efforts to improve and enhance customer service
and experience throughout the department and particularly in areas related to taxes and vehicle
services. DFA Field Audit staff indicate that as recently as 2021, Field Audit had a “penal focus” culture of
enforcement as staff interacted with taxpayers. Leadership are working to change this based on the
belief that improving customer experience in areas such as tax services generate a strong return on
investment. DFA has encouraged a shift towards more of a “customer” focus and working with taxpayers
and businesses in a collaborative and educational manner, including in their training efforts.
The primary goal of the Office of Field Audit is to encourage voluntary compliance by taxpayers with
state tax laws, increase revenues, and reduce tax delinquencies. The Office also supports the tax and
licensing sections of the Revenue Division. According to Field Audit staff, the Office strives to educate
audited taxpayers about the tax law, rules, and proper recordkeeping. While statutory interest must be
assessed, Field Auditors are authorized to decline to assess otherwise required statutory penalties to
audit liabilities when the taxpayer can show that the noncompliance is due to reasonable cause and not
to willful neglect. Once the audit assessment is final, the DFA Secretary has discretion under the
Arkansas Tax Procedure Act to further reduce audit liabilities if certain statutory requirements are met.
According to department staff, each year there are over 20,000 businesses who qualify for closure due
to unpaid taxes. However, DFA Field Audit typically only closes about 12 businesses each year, or
roughly .06% of those who qualify. Staff believe the office’s success is due to efforts to assist each
delinquent taxpayer in getting back into compliance, rather than closing businesses, which is
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only viewed as an option once all other options have been exhausted. Their goal is to increase
collections via settlement agreements within three years, as opposed to reaching back as far as legally
allowable.
DFA Field Audit staff report that with these efforts to improve customer experience, auditors in their
division conduct their business face-to-face with delinquent taxpayers, often in very difficult situations.
Despite the complex functions performed by staff and the risk level of the job, the position grade for
these staff positions is misaligned and there are opportunities to elevate these grades to commensurate
with the work. The position grades and salaries of other audit functions are provided as a point of
comparison in Figure 31 (though functions are not totally analogous).
Figure 31 - Comparison of the Field Audit and Legislative Audit Positions and Associated Salaries
Source: Department of Finance and Administration.
Research, interviews, and other field work indicate that DFA Field Audit can further enhance customer
experience for taxpayers by aligning its training program with strategies and best practices related to
collaborative communication and goal setting.
Rationale: While DFA Field Audit has implemented a number of operational changes to align its
efforts with a more customer experience focus, DFA Field Audit indicates that it is still in the process of
updating its annual and new hire training to reflect the shift from a penal focus to a customer focus.
Initiative DFA-11 directs the department to update its training protocols to better align its taxpayer
services training with its enhanced “person-centered” customer experience practices. Trainings would
emphasize listening skills, negotiation, and other customer-centered competencies. Trainings would be
done via a new curriculum delivered by district Field Auditor managers.
There are established approaches that could be incorporated into DFA’s training to help staff achieve its
goal to be more person-centered. Motivational interviewing (“MI”) has been identified as an evidence-
based modality used across disciplines such as child welfare, criminal justice, and
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
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health, for collaborative problem solving and engagement that could serve as a best practice within Field
Audit to more effectively serve individuals through a “customer-centered” model. MI can be described
as “a collaborative, goal-oriented style of communication” that can aid in behavior change and help
individuals become ready, willing, and able to make a change. Figure 32 highlights the key features of
MI.
Figure 32 – Motivational Interviewing Key Features
Motivational Interview Features Other Approaches
Confrontation: Overriding the client’s impaired
Collaboration: Counseling involves a partnership that perspectives by imposing awareness and acceptance
honors the client’s expertise and perspectives. of “reality” that the client cannot see or will not
admit.
Education: The client is presumed to lack key
Evocation: Resources and motivation are presumed to
knowledge, insight, and/or skills that are necessary for
reside within the client.
change to occur.
Autonomy: The Advisor affirms the client’s right and Authority: The Advisor tells the client what he or she
capacity for self-direction. needs to do.
MI is ideally positioned to help Field Tax auditors to have a challenging discussion with a business owner
about unpaid taxes, and to move them from a state of inaction to the state’s desired action. Before
contemplating making needed change, the dynamic in MI begins as shown in Figure 33.
Figure 33 – How Facilitator Engages Client in Making Needed Change Using MI
Client Facilitator
Unaware that problem exists Build rapport
Too discouraged to think about change Build confidence, hope
Not considering change Acknowledge both pros and cons of change
Not yet concerned Double sided reflection
Give menu of options with small steps
Through working with a facilitator trained in MI, a client undergoes: 1. contemplation of change, 2.
preparation, 3. action, and 4. maintenance. As recurrences of past behavior occur, the facilitator aids
clients in regaining their learned skills. MI has been proven to advance behavioral change, helps clients
examine and accept their reality, and empowers clients to make personal change.
MI has been identified as a well-supported practice (highest rating) by the federal Title IV-E Prevention
Clearinghouse. The Clearinghouse reviews research on programs and services to support children and
families and prevent foster care placement, and categories programs/services as: well-supported,
supported, promising, or does not currently meet criteria based on this evidence. It has been
successfully implemented across state governments in child welfare, health and criminal justice. Figure
34 summarizes some state examples of MI application.
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MI has also been adopted by government entities in Arkansas, for example, by the Workforce
Development Board of Eastern Arkansas.
Figure 34 – Example State MI Applications
State Entity Summary
Texas Workforce “Transitional Motivation” class is available to staff and is used to help clients
Commission achieve the goals and outcomes in the Texas VR program, including
customer motivation, is a function of Texas VR process.
Wisconsin Vocational Rapid engagement of clients through MI is used to develop the client
Rehabilitation relationship. Staff training includes MI and Trauma Informed Care
principles. MI is included in the WIVR State Plan.
Michigan Department of The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services’ IV-E prevention plan
Health and Human includes use of MI for all caseworker training, along with trauma-
Services informed care training.
New York State Office of New York’s IV-E prevention plan highlights the intervention as a family
Children and Family engagement approach that can be used in a variety of settings and contexts.
Services
Source: Consultant team.18
DFA should also consider training for Field Auditors to include “first responder” behavioral health-
centered modalities to ensure the safety of tax auditors in the field, who may be engaging individuals in
crisis-type situations as they engage more in-person and with more customer-centered methods.
By reforming the existing training modules to be more customer experience-centered, such as through a
methodology like Motivational Interviewing, DFA will not only more strategically align its training to its
agency mission, but may also increase effectiveness in completing settlements, which may financially
benefit the state.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – DFA Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with DFA staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
● Participation in the trainings should be incentivized through recognition programs and potential
career advancement opportunities to address the risk of inadequate engagement from taxpayer
service representatives
● Implement standard training practice of contact with business owners in Arkansas to strengthen
“customer” relationship, learn skills that help field auditors understand concerns business
owners may have, develop good listening skills, and increase education opportunities for
businesses.
18 Child Welfare Information Gateway, “Motivational Interviewing: A Primer for Child Welfare Professionals,” Fact
Sheet, September 2023, https://www.childwelfare.gov/resources/motivational-interviewing-primer- child-
welfare-professionals/.
Texas Workforce Commission, VRS Manual: B-100 and course catalogue:
https://www.twc.texas.gov/agency/training-development.
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• Training field auditors in customer experience methodologies should be balanced with the need
to maintain focus on encouraging and enforcing tax compliance.
• As DFA Field Audit encourages more collaborative engagement of businesses and taxpayers, the
personal safety of staff in the field is a critical focus of any agency training.
• The State should consider opportunities to narrow or eliminate pay discrepancies for state
auditors, particularly as DFA field auditors are encouraged more to engage taxpayers and
businesses in-person to engage in negotiation, education, and resolution.
Recommended steps to implement customer-centered training (future state):
• Form a work group including frontline staff, management, and leadership that is responsible for
revising the training available to Field Audit staff.
• This group should start by defining the outcomes it seeks to achieve (see below) and the core
competencies it seeks to develop for staff, assessing whether current training builds those
competencies or identifying gaps where new resources are needed.
o One consideration is on diffusing escalating situations and ensuring the personal safety
of Field Auditors. Field Auditors may not be effective in customer-centered roles if they
do not feel safe or educated on personal safety; DFA may consider “first- responder-
type: training for potential crisis-like situations.
o Motivational Interviewing is a training protocol that should be considered as part of this
assessment.
• Determine whether to build or purchase new training. Acquire new training materials.
• Create a pilot to test delivery of new materials with a dedicated unit(s).
• Assess the outcomes of the pilot, such as through a pre- and post-pilot survey of staff.
• Modify materials based on pilot and develop a timeline and implementation plan for division-
wide implementation.
• Deliver training through new dedicated Revenue division training team.
• Establish a review process to continuously assess training effectiveness and make necessary
adjustments.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Enhancing customer experience
for taxpayers is a high priority of the Department and implementing augmented training opportunities
through this initiative to improve engagement with taxpayers aligns strategically with this priority. As
noted in the introduction, creating a training unit within the Revenue Division would support
implementation of this initiative. The plan for the training unit as it impacts the tax program areas
includes a Program Manager (GS-14) with a lead (GS-12) embedded within each of the tax sections in
the Revenue Division. Note that additional resources would be embedded within other Revenue
Department divisions as outlined in Initiative #0.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial cost estimates for FTE time and any
necessary development costs have the potential recurring financial impact of approximately
$850,000. If the investments in training are made, there would likely be no additional cost to implement
this initiative unless the team determined purchase of a curriculum is needed.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: The intent of
this initiative is to provide staff with a resource to fulfill existing functions more effectively
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and to build on the good results achieved today with even stronger results. While this could result in
changes to staff standard operating procedures as MI is incorporated, it is not anticipated the high- level
processes used by DFA Field Audit will change.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected impacts of this
initiative are to improve the customer experience focus of an existing training program at DFA Field
Audit, improve education and relationship opportunities with Arkansas businesses, and improve
delinquent tax collections through improved negotiation and education of businesses and taxpayers.
Recommended performance measures include:
• Increased incidences of engagement with businesses as part of training protocol.
• Increased responses and negotiations generated through new training modalities.
• Increased (number and value) of settlement agreements reached within 3 years.
• Improved customer satisfaction with DFA Field Audit tax auditor services.
• Improved customer service quality and increased knowledge among taxpayer
representatives.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: This initiative is anticipated to result in external benefits to DFA’s stakeholders and long-
term increased effectiveness of the department in negotiating settlements and repayment.
Change Management Plan: MI is a methodology that supports the broader culture change that DFA is
undergoing to be more customer focused. This effort will require ongoing commitment from leadership,
follow-through, and time to reach all levels of employees including frontline staff. The implementation
plan included in Appendix A includes tasks focused on managing this change, which will begin with clear
communication to staff about the implementation and the “why” behind it. If interpreted by staff as
another requirement or addition to their workload, this initiative may not achieve the intended results.
If staff buy in to the approach and view the training positively as a tool to help them be more effective,
adoption will be as intended.
Figure 35 – DFA-11 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Internal staff ● Continuing customer ● Face-to-face meetings ● Eileen
experience focus at DFA with department Henderson
through tax auditor training. leadership
● Seeking improvements to ● Face-to-face meetings
taxpayer/business engagement with division
to improve effectiveness and leadership, including
efficiency in performing tax district offices
audits. ● Fliers in DFA office
locations across the
state
● Agency-wide emails
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
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Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Business community ● Building awareness in ● Social media ● Eileen
and taxpayers taxpayer/business community ● Fliers, emails at local Henderson
about tax policies and paying business organizations
delinquent taxes; negotiating
settlement agreements
Strategy: Improve Staff Experience
Improving staff experience is directly related to DFA’s goal to improve the customer experience: by
investing in its organization, DFA can not only improve morale, engagement, satisfaction, and retention,
but also pass those benefits on to the customers DFA serves through improved quality of work,
efficiency, and customer service, among other benefits. Staff experience initiatives include three key
Arkansas Forward initiatives:
• Expand DFA University to invest in emerging leaders (DFA-3)
• Establish a feedback system for employees to improve workplace conditions (DFA-25)
• Track and maximize fleet usage across departments (DFA-608)
Expand DFA University (DFA-U) to better invest in emerging leaders for future
leadership - Initiative DFA #3
This initiative recommends the expansion of the current DFA-U leadership program, which identifies DFA
employees with leadership potential and has shown promising outcomes in its current small- scale
configuration. Formalizing and investing in the program have the potential to improve employee hiring,
retention, and performance at DFA.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DFA-U is a department-wide leadership program designed to
identify employees within the department that demonstrate the characteristics and desire to be future
leaders within DFA. DFA-U “aligns with the department’s mission by assessing leadership gaps,
identifying potential leaders, and preparing these individuals to meet the department’s growing
leadership needs.” DFA-U is also considered an important deviation from the “silos” that traditionally
defined DFA.
DFA-U is offered in Little Rock over the course of a year, with attendees participating in monthly
meetings consisting of learning about different branches of the agency, participating in workshops,
completing assignments, and engaging in mentorship. Attendees are selected through a nomination
process done by agency administrators, who are the “boots on the ground” identifying potential DFA- U
candidates; administrators can pick 2-3 candidates to nominate.
According to data provided by DFA as shown below in Figure 36, the program has completed three
“academic years” as of May 2024. As of this date, 51 total candidates, or 96% of DFA-U attendees, have
completed the program. Of these 51 candidates, 49 are still at DFA, a 96% retention rate after 1-3 years.
45% of DFA-U graduates have been promoted, with 52% of this group promoted to “Manager” titles,
with at least two direct reports.
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Figure 36 - DFA-U Outcomes To-Date19
Program Completion Rate 96% 53 total candidates; 51 graduated
Graduate Retention Rate 96% 51 graduates; 49 graduates still at DFA
Program Promotion Rate 45% 51 Remaining Graduates; 23 Promotions to members since
starting DFA-U
*Some members were promoted multiple times.
Program Promotion to "Manager" 52% 12 of the 23 promotions were to a position that has at least
two direct reports.
Year 1 Promotion Rate 92% 13 Remaining Graduates; 12 Promoted since starting DFA-U
Year 2 Promotion Rate 53% 15 Remaining Graduates; 8 Promoted since starting DFA-U
Year 3 Promotion Rate 13% 21 Remaining Graduates; 3 Promoted since starting DFA-U
Notes: The data is provided by Department of Finance and Administration, as of 5/8/2024.
HR data only includes promotions granted after the employee began DFA-U. DFA University has completed three
academic years. There has been a total of 53 candidates who accepted the invitation to DFA University:
- 49 graduates remain employed at DFA.
- 4 graduates are no longer employed at DFA.
- 2 candidates did not complete the program.
The percentages provided were calculated using the total DFA-U graduates still employed at DFA.
While the program has demonstrated strong retention and promotion outcomes, interviews with DFA
staff indicate that there is a need to formalize the program, develop strategic partnerships to bolster it,
and expand its geographical range and programmatic offerings. For example, staff indicate that most of
the program attendees are from the Little Rock area or Central Arkansas due to geographic constraints
for other DFA employees. Staff have also identified that strengthening employee “hard” and “soft” skills,
such as writing and public speaking, across the state is a necessity to improve leadership and
advancement and develop their workforce pipeline as an agency. DFA staff also indicate DFA-U is key to
retention of staff, with staff indicating that employees will otherwise move to different agencies. The
agency would like to increase its graduates per year to 50 per year, as opposed to the approximately 20
graduates per year, currently.
Program leadership believes the success of the program is reliant upon its expansion by four different
channels: 1) Offering the leadership program regionally and geographically; 2) Enhancing the current
curriculum; 3) Offering Alumni training; and, 4) Developing Partnerships with Community Colleges
Assistance is needed to identify and implement best practices and improve the program. Program
leadership has indicated that the DFA-U expansion cannot occur without the implementation of technical
tools and support. Currently DFA does not have a full-time-equivalent (FTE) resource
19
DFA staff
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dedicated to DFA-U. Instead, the program is run by DFA staff with other responsibilities. DFA also has
plans to build on DFA-U with “DFA Grad School” to make additional training available for leaders.
Rationale: The costs associated with recruiting, hiring, and training new state employees can be
considerable, with some estimates of replacing an employee ranging from approximately 16% to 200% of
spending on annual salaries20; by other estimates, 150% of a departed employee’s annual salary.21 By
expanding the DFA-U program, DFA and the state may have the opportunity to increase talent
identification of high-qualified individuals, improve retention, and increase internal promotion. In
addition, the state of Arkansas may benefit from the increased production of high quality and well-
trained employees delivering service. Staff indicate that DFA salaries for lower-level employees make
attracting and retaining employees challenging; DFA-U is viewed as an alternative offering to help hire,
train, and promote high performing, lower-level employees at the agency.
Initiative DFA-3 directs the department to expand its DFA-U program, which could involve greater
dedication of resources for personnel and materials.
DFA-U has demonstrated promising outcomes within its three-year existence, but there are opportunities
for expansion:
• Given limited internal curriculum materials and resources, greater resources and/or strategic
partnerships could enable an improved and more geographically available curriculum.
• Improved access to information and development of the curriculum could help strengthen
program offerings.
• Alumni of DFA-U need to be engaged intentionally to continue to develop their talent in skill
such as project management.
• Collectively, these strategies support continued expansion and formalization of DFA-U.
Other states have successfully offered state-wide, multi-stage leadership training to help identify,
develop, and retain public sector employees. Figure 37 outlines a best practice from the Texas Health
and Human Services Commission (HHSC), which has developed a leadership program consisting of four
modules, two programs and two “academies” to serve four departments. Through this leadership
program HHSC has reached 53,000 employees of HHSC. The program has existed for 12 years, with a
retention rate of ~70% for all employees who have completed the program and an advancement rate of
~50%. HHSC program staff indicate that the rewards of their program are that the programs are highly
visible, help further growth, and participants are able to network with agency employee with whom they
would otherwise never work. Graduates receive certificates as well as training hours.
20 Government Executive, “What Keeps Public Employees In Their Jobs? It’s Not Just Pay,” January 11, 2023,
https://www.govexec.com/management/2023/01/what-keeps-public-employees-their-jobs-its-not-just-
pay/381709/#:~:text=Turnover%20among%20government%20employees%20is,experience%20required%20
for%20the%20job.
21 Government Executive, “Replacing a Government Employee Can Cost 150% of Worker's Salary,” July 22, 2021,
https://www.route-fifty.com/workforce/2021/07/replacing-government-employee-can-cost-150-workers- salary/183989/
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
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Figure 37 – Best Practice: Texas Health and Human Services Commission
Program Program Features
• Meant for high performing individuals, not managers or supervisors, that want to
grow within their own skill set and within agency.
• Four months in duration and it is 100% virtual.
• Program consists of four sessions and then a graduation ceremony. The
sessions are 1.5-2 days.
• The purpose of ECP is for the employees to “Own Their Influence.” They are
taught that leadership is influence and they leave with understanding that they
take ownership of that principle.
Extraordinary Contributors
• Participants are paired up with a “Transitional Mentor” – a front-line manager
Program (ECP)
that has made the transition to manager in the last two years. The Transitional
Mentor is supposed to connect with the mentee on at least 4 sessions outside the
program sessions.
• Participants are asked to do projects and come up with recommendations, for
example: how do you make meetings meaningful?
• This program offers an opportunity to serve as coach; participants get a book
called “Active Coaching” and receive a ½ day or full day of coaching.
• The program puts participants in groups of six, which helps develop a bond with
five peers.
• Participants are high performing individuals who want to move into
management or supervision.
• Program assesses whether employees are equipped to make the shift mentally and
emotionally to leadership roles: are employee’s individual contributions to a team
or someone who can lead a team?
Aspiring Leaders Program
• Focus on the different mental and emotional skill set needed to supervise
(ALP)
people.
• Objective for program is clarity – do they really want to supervise people?
• The program is 4 months in duration; with 1.5-day sessions occurring
approximately every 3 weeks.
• The program offers a hybrid option of in-person or Zoom participation.
• The academy is for those new to the management and the leadership ladder.
• Attendees are taught from book “The Five Dysfunctions of the Team” by Patrick
Rising Leaders Academy
Lencioni.
(RLA)
• This academy includes in-depth leadership learning.
• A 360 Self-Assessment is required for each participant.
• The Executive Leadership academy is for senior leaders, senior managers and
directors, to help prepare for executive leadership.
• Unlike other leadership programs, for this academy, the head of the agency
Executive Leadership
must approve a candidate’s attendance.
Academy
• A 360 Self-Assessment is required, and candidates must also complete a
leadership development plan.
• Attendees are assigned a mentor.
Source: Interview with Texas Health and Human Services Commission official.
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For the ECP and ALP programs, participants complete an application, which a manager has to approve.
Applications are based on first come first served. Program cohorts are limited to 36 participants for
these for these programs. For the Academies, seats are selected by the executives in the agency.
Academies meet for a total of six months. For all the programs, there is homework and prework, and for
ELA, participants must come back to give a 15-minute presentation after they have completed the
program.
HHSC reviews their leadership program every two years. Evaluations by participants are based on three
principles: was the content relevant, reliable and applicable. Program staff at HHSC stressed that
important factors of the program’s success are: 1. That they do not spend time on agency information
and do not have directors or bureau heads come in to give talks; 2. They do not use a traditional
classroom; 3. They do not use the words “training” or “curriculum” or “info dump” – the curricula for
their programs instead aim to be “fluid and organic” and focused on applicable tools that are relevant to
the current workforce. The topics evolve between years. For graduates of their programs, there is an
Alumni Association, which enables graduates to continue their leadership development. Alumni have
access to an alumni list serve and there is also a newsletter that is sent out to graduates.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – DFA Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with DFA staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Conduct regular feedback sessions to understand and address any concerns, offer incentives for
participation, and ensure programs are aligned with career aspirations to address the risk of low
engagement from identified talent.
• Rotate mentors annually to prevent burn-out or waning interest from leadership address the
risk of lack of engagement from leadership/mentors.
• Ensure follow-through and consistency in the program, by dedicating a full-time staff person to
operate and lead the DFA-U program.
Recommended steps for expanding and formalizing DFA-U offerings (future state):
• Assess current talent and skills gaps in the organization and identify potential future leaders.
• Develop an expansion plan for the current DFA-U model with the DFA-U leadership (e.g.,
expanding number of enrollees, adding additional programming).
• Identify technical tools and resources needed to expand and formalize existing program
offerings.
• Consider tiered or progressive program offerings for different levels of professional
development as identified in best practice case study.
• Consider the ability to offer a fully virtual or hybrid option for programs to enable increased
geographic participation.
• Develop competency framework outlining the skills and competencies required for future
leaders across all divisions.
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• Partner with institutions of higher education such as Arkansas State University and community
colleges to access education and training resources while also opening recruitment channels for
future agency employees.
• Develop tailored training and development programs focusing on leadership, technical skills, and
soft skills.
• Preview and receive approval from Secretary and broader DFA leadership team on expansion
program.
• Implement best practices for mentorship program to improve and expand current offering to
pair emerging talent with experienced leaders.
• Develop an alumni association or similar post-graduate program to keep graduates engaged and
enable continued opportunities to network and develop skills.
• Regularly assess the progress and impact of the development programs through quarterly
evaluations.
• Continuously refine programs based on feedback and performance data.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Recruiting, training, and
developing leaders throughout the organization to meet the agency’s high standards of performance is
central to DFA’s mission and priorities, however there are no FTEs dedicated to the DFA-U program
today. This project could be supported by implementation of Initiative #0, which locates a training unit
within the Revenue division. DFA may choose to dedicate or partially dedicate staff to this program.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: DFA may consider augmenting its DFA-U
program by hiring one person dedicated to developing materials, curriculum, and programming as well
as scheduling, planning, and executing the program, but it is recommended this is done in a fiscally
neutral manner through repurposing of vacant positions or by earmarking expected recoupments from
improved employee retention.
Per DFA initial estimates, a potential recurring financial impact identified could be around $500,000 per
year to implement this initiative fully, including the hiring of an FTE to run the program and additional
resources for curriculum development, training (including possible technology costs), and events.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: DFA will need to
establish policies and procedures for DFA-U related to state-wide training offerings, developing an
alumni component, and potentially creating a new role within the agency to staff the program.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected impacts of this
initiative are to increase the number of DFA-U attendees in total, increase statewide participation in the
program, develop strategic partnerships to augment the program, and improve DFA retention and
promotion of employees. Recommended performance measures include:
• Number of DFA-U attendees
• Number of DFA-U graduates
• Geographic representation within DFA-U cohorts
• Promotion rate for DFA-U graduates
• Retention rate for DFA-U graduates
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Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: No potential savings were identified in relation to this initiative directly, but the intent is
to realize long-term cost avoidance through increased staff retention.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration with institutions of higher education is essential to this
initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are included for each audience in Figure 38. Key
activities and timing for communication plan are included in Appendix A – Work Plan.
Figure 38 – DFA-3 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Internal staff ● Expanding an opportunity to ● Face-to-face ● Amy Valentine
recognize and develop meetings with ● Christa Hulett
leadership-caliber workforce department
within the agency. leadership
● Expanding ability for employees ● Face-to-face
to attend throughout the state, meetings with
either remotely or through division leadership
hybrid offering. ● Fliers in DFA office
● Marketing to alumni of DFA-U locations across the
that additional opportunities for state
advancement/training will be ● Agency-wide
offered to continue refinement emails
of skills and capabilities. ● Social media
Prospective DFA ● Marketing to prospective DFA ● Fliers, emails at ● Amy Valentine
employees employees that a benefit of local community ● Christa Hulett
employment with the agency is colleges and 4-
career development, leadership year institutions
development, and upward throughout the
mobility/opportunities for career state.
advancement within the agency. ● Social media
Establish a feedback system for employees to improve workplace conditions -
Initiative DFA #25
This initiative recommends the implementation of a feedback channel and response approach to collect
and address employee pain points to become a premier workplace in the state by employees feeling
heard and their working conditions improving over the next year. Examples of a feedback channel could
include establishment of an annual employee engagement and satisfaction survey (or use of more
frequent pulse surveys) and use of qualitative methods to gain a richer understanding of employee
views generally and on specific topics through focus groups or employee town halls.
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
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Initiative Overview and Current State: While there is no single perfect measure to assess
employee satisfaction and engagement, existing data demonstrate some opportunity for improvement.
In FY 2023, DFA reported having 2,261 employees across the agency and a vacancy rate of 17.7% (based
on authorized position count of 2,747).
Overall turnover at DFA is 16.76% and turnover varies by division as shown in Figure 39, which may
provide an opportunity to identify areas of focus to improve employee engagement and retention.
Racing, Management Services, and Assessment Coordination Department, and the Lottery division have
the lowest rates of turnover and may prove instructive in addressing turnover at the Revenue Division
and within Shared Services, which have the highest rates.
Figure 39 – DFA Turnover, 2024 year-to-date
Division/Program Turnover Rate
0490 ACD 11.54%
0610 Mgmt Svcs 10.77%
0611 ABC Admin 15.38%
0613 Lottery 12.33%
0630 Revenue Div 18.73%
Field Audit 11.59%
Legal Counsel 13.16%
SRO 21.42%
0631 Racing 0%
0634 OCSE 14.76%
9906 Shared Svcs 18.81%
Overall Average for DFA 16.76%
Source: Office of Personnel Management.
Note: Three sub-units of the Revenue Division are shown for illustrative purposes. There are additional staff units
within the Revenue Division not shown.
DFA’s stated goal is to be a premier state department—a place people want to work and a trusted
partner with which the public and other state departments want to do business. Arkansas DFA was also
recently touted as a “State as a Model Employer” site by the Council of State Governments, for its
policies and practices states designed to increase the recruitment, hiring, retention, and advancement of
people with disabilities within state government. DFA undertakes its own employee training and
leadership initiatives, with DFA-U (see DFA-3) showing positive outcomes in leader identification,
promotion, and retention.
Despite DFA’s goals to make the department a premier workplace in the state, focus groups and
interviews with DFA staff indicate that there is currently no employee feedback system in place aside
from annual performance evaluations or exit interviews, which are reportedly not consistent and do not
result in data that can be collected or analyzed to identify trends or issues. Without actionable insight
into employee satisfaction, needs, and department culture, DFA is at risk of not only losing employees,
but also inability to provide best-in-class service to residents of Arkansas through its multitude of citizen-
and business-facing operations. Conversely, DFA can build a culture of feedback, informed by an
employee feedback process, that will yield data to drive decisions, policy, and interventions aimed at
improving staff experience, satisfaction, and professional development. These efforts will support DFA in
its efforts to build a strong culture with engaged employees.
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Rationale: Staff focus groups revealed a common sentiment that establishment of a regular and
recurring employee feedback channel to collect and respond to employees could help improve
workplace conditions.
Figure 40 – Sample of Responses from Two June 2024 DFA Employee Focus Groups
● Improved workplace conditions and culture; barometer for happiness of
employees and well-being
● Breaking barriers between leadership and employees
● Establishing culture that encourages and values feedback through regular
meetings, surveys, and other dedicated feedback channels
Goals for
● Employee feedback system will help department leadership understand how
Feedback
employees feel and think about their workplace, and can be used to improve
System
workplace conditions, and employee development
● Improved communication
● Better understand employee needs/learning styles
● Identification of employee needs, gaps in training
● Improved team mentality/feelings of inclusivity; improved workplace morale
● Opportunities to provide honest, confidential feedback, catch issues early on
● Information gathered through “culture of emotional safety,” ability to speak up
without perceived repercussions
● Central repository for employee feedback: way to collect and aggregate exit
Types of interviews and other feedback data
Information to ● Training feedback, effectiveness of training based on type, method; opportunities for
Collect to improved trainings (ex. child support training) and professional development
Improve ● Improved practice, policy information: are they outdated?
Agency Culture ● Evaluations of superiors- 360 Reviews should be considered
● Office environment- if any changes needed, workplace satisfaction
● Inclusive activities across all divisions
● Customer experience and morale information
● Information on Opportunities for advancement
● Incentives and acknowledgement for employee excellence
Initiative DFA-25 directs the department to develop a feedback channel and response approach to
collect and address employee pain points to become a premier workplace in the state by employees
feeling heard and their working conditions improving over the next year. Implementation of this
initiative has the potential to identify opportunities to improve workplace experience, employee
satisfaction and training, and strengthen inter-agency communication, among other benefits. These
potential benefits to DFA employees may also be passed onto the customer through improved
employee retention and experience, training, and job satisfaction.
Implementation Considerations: Many public and private employers use employee satisfaction and
engagement surveys to collect employee feedback on a variety of topics. There are a variety of tools
available for purchase such as the Glint, Perceptyx, Officevibe, Qualtrics. The benefit of engaging these
firms is that they offer not only a survey tool to capture feedback but also access to resources to design
a customized survey for the organization and data on other employers to benchmark data against other
employers in their industry. There exists a large body of research on relevant domains of questions and
question design types (Likert scales) by industry.
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In addition to these tools, some states have developed their own tools or partnered with educational
institutions to build customized surveys for their state employees. Some examples of how other states
have approached this issue include:
• Texas Survey of Employee Engagement (SEE) survey: The survey is distributed every two years
by the University of Texas Institute for Organizational Excellence to approximately 250,000 state
employees (including higher education institutions and school districts) and includes areas such
as communication, supervision, quality, teamwork, pay and benefits, training, diversity, ethics,
management, engagement, and technology. Use of the survey consistently over time has
allowed departments to establish a baseline and measure incremental changes, identifying
where to focus.22
• Oklahoma State Employee Engagement Survey: The survey was implemented annually
beginning in 2020 and is administered by the Oklahoma M ES Human Capital Management
Team and includes domains such as work culture, satisfaction, culture, and engagement. The
survey is administered in the Spring through a web-based application and is available for
anyone with a state-issued email address to complete. An annual summary of findings is
released publicly.
• Washington State Employee Engagement Survey (EES): The Office of Financial Management,
State Human Resources division administers a survey to state employees, and individual
departments have the option to administer their own survey. The survey occurs annually in
October, dating back to 2006. The 2023 survey included 37 questions engagement, diversity,
communication, resources, growth/development, inclusion/belonging, manager effectiveness,
change management, among others. An annual summary of results is publicly available.
• Minnesota developed a guide for state agencies on how to use employee survey data
proactively through creation of action plans.23 Minnesota Management and Budget has used an
annual state employee engagement survey since 2018. The MMB Enterprise Talent
Development team has responsibility not only for developing the survey, releasing annual
results, but also supporting state departments in using the information to support process
improvement.
In addition to these methods, there are other ways organizations seeking to build a feedback culture can
collect employee feedback on a more continuous basis (instead of only through an annual survey).
Qualitative processes can be paired with surveys to conduct more thorough qualitative analysis on
specific topics to gain additional detail and inform interventions. Some employers have created digital
channels for employee engagement and feedback (e.g., publishing frequently asked questions in
response to questions submitted online or through comment boxes) and creating digital town halls
where the chat or comment function is enabled. These methods allow for employee engagement with
leadership. They introduce different degrees of risk (e.g., the pressure to respond to questions live) but
can be adapted based on the needs of an organization and preferences of leadership.
22Texas Institute for Organizational Excellence, “Survey of Employee Engagement,” https://sites.utexas.edu/ioe/survey.
23Minnesota MMB, "State Agency Employee Engagement Survey, Action Planning Toolkit,"
https://mn.gov/mmb-stat/enterprise-talent-development/2019-engagement/state-agency-employee-
engagement-survey-action-planning-toolkit.pdf.
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Appendix A – DFA Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with DFA staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Ensure employee awareness of and participation in feedback mechanisms created. Promote the
feedback system through internal communications, offer incentives for participation, and
highlight success stories to build trust to address the risk of low employee engagement. Most
surveys can preserve employee anonymity to encourage participation, while gathering some
information such as division to enable aggregation.
• Consider collecting feedback through multiple channels to encourage participation, such as an
annual or semi-annual survey paired with a comment form posted on internal employee
intranet or Sharepoint sites; physical comment boxes in offices; and interactive employee town
halls. At least some methods should all provide for anonymity of feedback.
• Ensure dedicated resources for managing feedback received, establish clear accountability, and
continuously review and improve response protocols to address the risk of inadequate
responses to feedback. Creation of feedback channels can send a powerful signal to employees
that their feedback is welcome and their concerns are heard by leadership. However, it is
essential to convey to employees that their feedback is being acted upon; failure to respond to
feedback undermines the process and can have the opposite impact of what is intended.
Examples of how to use feedback include:
o Sharing survey results transparently with staff.
o Analyzing data by division to identify low-scoring areas and working with those leaders
to develop custom actions to improve staff experience.
o Identifying low-scoring topics and creating strategies to address them that are built into
annual strategic plans (e.g., improving training); and,
o Sharing data with division leaders and supporting them in developing solutions specific
to their teams (e.g., making more training resources available or addressing concerns
with supervision).
• Commit to long-term change management through consistent use of feedback channels over
time, sharing of results, and visible implementation of initiatives to respond to the feedback
received. These efforts support the building of trust and buy-in, which were identified as
barriers to implementation of a successful employee feedback system in the focus groups.
Recommended steps to implement an employee feedback mechanism (future state):
• Form a committee to oversee the design and implementation of employee feedback program,
to include human resources leadership and representatives across divisions and staff levels (to
include management and frontline staff).
• Complete a cost-benefit analysis of creating an internal survey vs. finding a partner such as an
academic institution or vendor to develop and administer the survey.
• Identify additional feedback collection strategies (e.g., comment boxes, town halls, staff Q&As,
leadership blog, meetings with executive leadership).
• Based on survey decision, either build or contract with entity to administer survey
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• Develop communication plan, to promote survey in advance of release and include plan for
dissemination of results.
• Administer survey and other feedback approaches.
• Create a summary of results to share with staff/public.
• Create toolkit for leaders to act upon feedback provided (annually for survey, including
connection to strategic planning, and ongoing for other mechanisms).
• Conduct training sessions for employees and managers on how to use the feedback system and
respond appropriately, and how to provide effective feedback. This includes efforts to promote
transparency with managers/encourage managers and leaders to indicate they are listening and
learning from data collected
• Regularly assess the quality of feedback provided to determine if adjustments to this approach
are required. For example, the frequency of the survey may need to be adjusted or qualitative
methods may be used to investigate issues that appear on a survey (e.g., if scores significantly
decline in one domain year-over-year, a focus group may be needed to gain additional insights
and support implementation of corrective measures).
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Enhancing customer experience
for taxpayers is a high priority of the Department, as is making DFA a premier workplace in the state of
Arkansas. Implementing an internal feedback system for employees to improve employee satisfaction
and performance aligns strategically with the priorities of the agency.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial estimates by DFA indicate that one
full-time equivalent (FTE) resource would be required to develop, launch, and manage employee
engagement and feedback programs. Technology will be required to track employee satisfaction and
receive response submissions. Initial cost estimates for FTE time and any necessary IT tool development
costs have the potential recurring financial impact of approximately $250,000.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: Acting on
collected feedback requires an ongoing central resource to manage analysis of feedback and oversee
implementation of corrective steps and initiatives to address feedback. Creation of a culture of feedback
requires the commitment of each leader to receive and act on feedback. Existing business processes
may require change in response to employee suggestions (e.g., process improvements).
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected impacts of this
initiative are to collect more actionable employee feedback data on the employee experience at DFA
and effectively harness this data to improve agency operations. This initiative is expected to increase
employee satisfaction, engagement, and retention. Recommended performance measures include:
● Employee satisfaction rate (net promoter score).
● Employee engagement rate (response rate); and,
● Employee retention (overall, by division, by position).
Over time, this initiative is also expected to improve customer service quality (which can shorten
response times or improve the accuracy of transactions).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: No potential savings were identified in relation to this initiative in the short-term,
though in the long-term is expected to contribute to greater satisfaction and retention, which reduces
departmental hiring and training costs. Creation of this feedback program is one reinvestment as a result
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
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of Arkansas Forward; out of anticipated cost savings and cost avoidance from other Arkansas Forward
initiatives, DFA would invest in dedicated staff and a tool to measure employee feedback. Costs are
expected related to staff and the tool to administer the survey (which can be mitigated depending on
how DFA chooses to administer it).
Change Management Plan: DFA-U is an established and respected program within DFA today. It is not
anticipated that the department would experience significant change management in implementing this
initiative, however, communication about program changes will be needed.
Figure 41 – DFA-25 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Internal staff ● Leadership at DFA wants to hear ● Face-to-face ● Amy Valentine
from staff to improve the work meetings with ● Christina
place and service delivery to the department and Hulett
public. division
● A new feedback system is being leadership.
developed to help support ● Staff town halls.
employees. Input will be ● All staff email from
anonymous and not used Secretary Hudson
punitively. to encourage
● Results will be shared and participation.
actions taken in response to ● Physical flyers in
feedback provided [add detail DFA office
depending on design of locations.
program].
Track and maximize fleet usage across departments - Functional Initiative 608
This initiative recommends the creation of a minimum viable web-based tool to realign trips to lowest-
cost mode of transport (e.g., mileage reimbursement versus pool vehicle) to minimize waste and
increase transparency. This initiative is intended first to support DFA staff in making the decision on
whether to use a department vehicle or their own vehicle, and then to be expanded may be to all
Arkansas departments based on success.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The DFA State Office of Accounting and Transformation and
Shared Services (TSS) Office of State Procurement coordinate resources and negotiates contracts to
ensure the greatest possible return on the state’s travel investment for Arkansas state government
employees conducting travel in the performance of their job duties.
A.C.A § 19-4-902 places the authority and responsibility of authorizing and approving travel expenses
with the board or commission in charge or the administrative head of the agency, department, or
institution. Interviews conducted with state agency staff have highlighted the finding that there
currently is a great deal of variation between and among agencies when it comes to travel. The
Department of Health Services, for example, indicates that staff must use state vehicles or else forgo
mileage reimbursement, while DFA requires use of vehicle if available but also allows for
reimbursement. The DFA Travel Portal indicates prominently that “State employees should always refer
to their agency's policy and procedures” when planning travel as a state employee.
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A 2014 Enterprise tool, see Figure 42 below, on the DFA website enables users to compare the cost of a
car rental for a given trip versus the projected mileage reimbursement a state employee would receive
for the same trip. DFA staff indicate they would like to transition from a spreadsheet-based tool to a
user-friendly web-based tool. This tool would input information from a variety of sources:
reimbursement rates for mileage as set by the Office of Accounting, as well as vehicle availability.
Figure 42 – Travel Cost Calculator, DFA
Source: DFA Website.
Standardizing the use of a minimum viable tool such as this throughout DFA has the potential to
streamline cost considerations for state employee travel and may result in cost avoidance to the state.
Initiative FUNC-608 directs DFA to create minimum viable digital tool to realign trips to lowest- cost
mode of transport (e.g., mileage reimbursement vs pool vehicle) to minimize waste and increase
transparency. DFA can develop and pilot this tool in a single DFA department, with the potential to
expand to other departments within DFA and eventually to other departments in Arkansas.
Implementation Considerations: Other states have tackled the issue of state travel by creating
resources for state employees to use in making travel decisions. For example, the Texas Office of the
Comptroller, Fiscal Management Team, maintains a web-based tool today; this resource was developed
first as a spreadsheet and then modernized into a web-based tool. The Team has shared its coding with
DFA for assessment in developing its own resource.
Appendix A – DFA Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with DFA staff and review of other state best practices include:
DFA Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024
72
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Include DFA staff in the development and testing of the tool and related instructions to support
roll-out across the department.
• Set policy to enforce use of the tool within DFA to help the department capture the benefit from
the tool (financially).
• Implement regular data validation checks, ensure data is collected from reliable sources, and
provide training on accurate data entry to mitigate risk of data inaccuracy.
• Consult other states or external resources to construct the tool, given that internal staff may not
have the experience to convert existing business rules into requirements of the tool.
Recommended steps to implement mileage tool (future state):
• Collect existing travel rules and policies and related data for input into the tool (working with
the Office of Accounting and Chief Fiscal Officer).
• Identify data source for real-time availability of DFA fleet for input into the tool.
• Document business rules and logic for the tool.
• Create the minimum viable web-based tool, including cost comparison feature.
• Implement the tool in a selected department to test functionality and gather initial data
• Preview and receive approval from Secretary and broader DFA leadership team prior to
expanding the tool offering to other departments.
• Collect and analyze feedback from pilot users to identify necessary adjustments
o Identify and coach any non-users to address any challenges or resistance to tool
adoption
• Deploy the refined tool across all departments and provide comprehensive training for users.
• Track tool usage, cost savings, and user feedback, providing detailed reports to stakeholders.
• Expand to other departments as appropriate.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Standardizing the calculation of
state travel to identify the lowest-cost mode of transport to minimize waste and increase transparency
is aligned with DFA priorities.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: It is assumed DFA can deploy this tool
within existing resources.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: DFA should
consider implementing policy to require use of the mileage tool and a mechanism to demonstrate the
most cost-effective travel method was used as part of the travel reimbursement process.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected impacts of this
initiative are to collect more actionable employee feedback data on the employee experience at DFA
and effectively harness this data to improve agency operations. Recommended performance measures
include:
• Increase in more efficient state vehicle utilization
• Cost avoidance/savings generated by utilizing tool
• Increased transparency in car utilization
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• Increased standardization of travel cost estimates
• Broad uptake/full adoption of the tool
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: If implemented with policy that employees must use the most cost-effective mode of
transportation (allowing for certain exceptions related to emergencies), DFA could realize cost
avoidance related to consistent employee use of the most cost-effective option for travel. There are
expected to be some costs to deploy the web-based tool, but it is assumed this could be accomplished
within existing IT resources.
Change Management Plan: Employee adherence to policy and use of the calculator tool is necessary
for DFA to realize a return on investment for this initiative. Communication with staff about the tool and
how to use it are an important part of implementation. These tasks are included in Attachment A – DFA
Work Plan and summarized in Figure 43 below.
Figure 43 – FUNC-608 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Internal staff ● DFA is implementing a new ● Face-to-face ● Melanie
resource to help employees meetings with Hazeslip
determine the most cost- department ● Office of State
effective means of travel. leadership Procurement
● Tool will aid in standardizing ● Face-to-face team
travel calculations for state meetings with
employees. division
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
● Tool has potential to reduce leadership, ● TSS Office of
costs for state agency. including district Information
● DFA has created detailed offices Services team
instructions for employee use ● Agency-wide
of this tool. emails.
● Evidence of use will be needed
to receive travel
reimbursement.
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74
Strategic Management Plan:
Arkansas Department of Human Services
Table of Contents
Overview ................................................................................................................. 1
Recommended Organizational Structure................................................................... 2
Meeting the Vision of an Effective and Efficient Future Department: ..................................................... 4
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation ................................ 4
Initiative DHS #1 - DHS Contract Oversight and Vendor Management Unit ..................................5
Initiative DHS #2 - Redesigned customer service capabilities and staffing model ...................... 15
Initiative DHS #3 - Increase awareness of Home and Community Based Services ..................... 25
Initiative DHS #4 - Restructure Medicaid Operations Under Single Appropriation ...................... 33
Initiative DHS #5 - Increase customer contact points in community settings .............................39
Initiative DHS #6 - Maximize additional federal funding opportunities .......................................46
Initiative DHS #7 - Strengthening Payment Integrity and FWA Function ......................................61
Initiative DHS #8 - Focus on talent targeting and career development .......................................71
Initiative DHS #9 - Deploy Internal Trainings for DHS and Cross-Departmental Staff .................. 83
Initiative DHS #10 - Streamline Medicaid eligibility and enrollment for maternity care................ 91
Overview
Arkansas Department of Human Services (DHS) is the largest agency in Arkansas state government,
with a 2024 budget of more than $10.6 billion primarily comprised of federal pass-through and
entitlement funding, but state general revenue accounts for $1.8 billion of that amount. DHS provides
a variety of services for the citizens of Arkansas, including providing medical and behavioral health
services and cash assistance to those in need, conducting adoption and foster home programs,
operating HCBS and human development centers for the state’s residents with intellectual and
developmental disabilities, and regulating nursing homes.
DHS leadership has articulated four pillars reflecting the department’s strategic priorities:
• Prevention, prevention, prevention!
• Medicaid sustainability review process
• Behavioral health continuum of care
• Improving employee experience
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 1
Through Arkansas Forward, a 2024 effort to improve the efficiency of Arkansas’ agencies, the
department has placed an emphasis in aligning with these strategic priorities and its “One DHS”
initiative, which looks for redundancies, potential synergies, and economies of scale across the
agency to deliver a greater return on investment for taxpayers and allow the State of Arkansas to
redeploy resources elsewhere to provide better value. Each DHS division is examining how it delivers
services and how to prevent individuals from needing services, and developing the strongest team
possible by ensuring it has the right leaders deployed in the right roles. These changes will lead DHS
on the path of fiscal sustainability, higher quality service delivery, and the development of a stable,
engaged team of employees for the future.
Recommended Organizational Structure
Over the last seven years, DHS has implemented a variety of organizational changes to create a more
efficient organization and align the organization’s structure with the department’s core roles and
responsibilities, governance, and performance measure goals. Some examples of these efforts
include:
• Centralization of shared services within DHS to drive productivity and efficiency (i.e.,
impacting areas such as procurement, finance, human resources, and information
technology);
• Periodic reorganization of programs to support collaboration and efficiency (i.e., creation of
the Director of Specialty Medicaid Services position to oversee the Division of Developmental
Disabilities Services, the Division of Aging, Adult, and Behavioral Health Services, and the
Office of Substance Abuse and Mental Health); and,
• Realignment of vacant positions to meet urgent department needs.
These efforts and others have resulted in the current organization structure, shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1 – Current Organizational Structure
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 2
As part of Arkansas Forward, DHS’ structure was reviewed to identify opportunities for redesign in
three areas:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission;
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives; and,
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions (i.e.,
information technology, human resources, procurement).
Recommendations based on department interviews and data analysis include:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission: The department
has identified three critical staffing areas where DHS requires upfront appropriation authority
and funding to fulfill its mission, including 1) nursing, 2) finance, and 3) frontline investigators
and other staff at the Division of Child and Family Services (DCFS) and Division of Youth
Services (DYS). These are areas where DHS struggles to recruit and hire qualified candidates
(based on available position grades and starting salaries) and to compete with the private
sector. Over time, DHS has had to rely on contractors in some of these areas (particularly
nursing and finance) to meet these needs. Through Arkansas Forward, DHS seeks
reinvestment from the cost savings/avoidance generated by its ten key initiatives into these
areas. This reinvestment is not only critical to help DHS fulfill its mission but is also expected
to result in a positive fiscal impact over time as DHS shifts from higher cost contractors to
more direct employees. This need is discussed more extensively in initiative DHS-8 later in
this report.
In addition to these staffing investments, DHS has also identified a mission critical
investment of approximately $6.0 million in its Division of Youth Services for infrastructure
and prevention services which would improve service delivery and outcomes for youth.
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives: Initiative
DHS-4 would consolidate DHS’ budget for Medicaid into a single appropriation, with all other
programs falling under a separate appropriation. If this initiative moves forward, DHS will
seek authority to realign its organizational structure with this appropriation by consolidating
Medicaid programs and associated support services under one leader (the Deputy Secretary
for Programs and State Medicaid Director). This organizational change would occur
incrementally over time and would yield a number of advantages for the department
including allowing for the braiding and blending of state and federal funding sources;
improving organizational efficiency; enhancing DHS’ “No Wrong Door” approach for
beneficiaries by aligning appropriations to allow for a more coordinated and holistic service
delivery; improving staff collaboration; creating clarity for staff, beneficiaries, and
stakeholders; and creating a more transparent operational structure.
• Consolidation of Ombudsman Services: Currently, DHS funds Ombudsman offices and
services that are not consolidated and are housed within two different external organizations.
The Provider-Led Arkansas Shared Saving Entity (PASSE) program has an Ombudsman office
within DHS that works to protect older adults’ health, safety, welfare, and rights by resolving
problems and promoting better consumer protection at the facility, local, state and national
level. There is a child welfare ombudsman division that is housed within the Arkansas
Commission on Child Abuse, Rape and Domestic Violence at the University of Arkansas
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 3
Medical Sciences. This Ombudsman reviews issues and resolves concerns involving a child
who has been subjected to abuse or neglect. There is also a Juvenile Ombudsman located at
the Arkansas Public Defender Commission that provides important independent oversight
and makes certain the health, safety and welfare of all vulnerable Arkansas youth receiving
juvenile services are not compromised. To maximize funding, coordinate and align these
important services, DHS believes citizens would be better served through consolidation of
all Ombudsman offices at the Department of Inspector General, and would like to submit this
organizational change to be considered as part of Arkansas Forward. The goals, objectives
and critical mission of all these Ombudsman offices involve independent investigation,
review, reporting, and resolution of citizen issues, and DHS believes Arkansas citizens in
need and payment integrity would be better served through this consolidation.
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions:
Based on direction from the Steering Committee, Transformation and Shared Services (TSS)
will assume responsibility for the Payroll and Help Desk functions statewide, as the first
Human Resources and Information Technology functions to transfer to TSS in a statewide
shared services model. Additional decisions on sequencing of further functions have not yet
been determined.
DHS’ recommended organizational structure is to continue with its current structure with no
immediate changes (with exception to those identified above), but to begin preparation for
implementation of a new Medicaid structure that aligns with its appropriation.
Meeting the Vision of an Effective and Efficient Future Department:
DHS leadership has continued to prioritize efficiency within its organization over the past
approximately ten years, undergoing a major shared services consolidation in 2015/2016 and making
additional improvements since then in alignment with the four strategic pillars and “One DHS”
initiative. DHS desires flexibility for its operation of the Medicaid program, through a single
appropriation, which would enhance efficiency of operations. DHS would match its organizational
structure to this appropriation, if approved by the Legislature, which would create a more efficient
operating model. Implementation of initiatives DHS-8 and DHS-9 will allow DHS to invest in its future
leaders and deepened the skillset of its staff through cross-training. A skilled leadership team and
workforce is essential for DHS in delivering on its mission and implementing the Arkansas Forward
initiatives successfully.
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation
DHS leadership generated approximately 50 ideas to improve the departmental effectiveness and
efficiency before prioritizing 10 initiatives for immediate implementation.
The complete list of the high priority Arkansas Forward initiatives for the department includes:
• DHS-1 – DHS Contract Oversight and Vendor Management Unit
• DHS-2 – Redesigned customer service capabilities and staffing model
• DHS-3 – Increase awareness of Home and Community-Based Services
• DHS-4 – Restructure Medicaid Operations Under a Single Appropriation
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 4
• DHS-5 – Increase customer contact points in community settings
• DHS-6 – Maximize additional federal funding opportunities
• DHS-7 – Strengthening payment integrity and FWA function
• DHS-8 – Focus on talent targeting and career development
• DHS-9 – Deploy internal trainings for DHS and cross-rained departmental staff
• DHS-10 – Streamline Medicaid eligibility and enrollment for maternity care
Initiative DHS #1 - DHS Contract Oversight and Vendor Management Unit
This initiative seeks to create a central unit in DHS to manage contract oversight and improve vendor
management, increasing return on investment (ROI) for DHS spending on contractors, improving
service outcomes for customers, and freeing up DHS staff time.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Effective contract and vendor management is critical to
DHS’s ability to develop and maintain excellent and effective service delivery systems as well as a
cornerstone for continuous success and positive outcomes. DHS spends over $504 million annually
on contracted services and manages 438 vendors across its divisions, with some examples
including:
• The Division of County Operations: distributes Community Services Block Grant awards to
Community Action Agencies
• The Division of Children and Family Services: contracts with private child placement
agencies
• The Office of Information Technology: manages information technology contracts for DHS,
including large contracts such as the integrated eligibility system for all public assistance
programs and the Medicaid Management Information System
• The Home and Community Based Services: contracts with long-term services and supports
providers
While procurement is a centralized function at DHS led by the Office of Procurement (OP), in
coordination with the Transformation and Shared Services (TSS) Office of State Procurement,
contract oversight and vendor management activities and functions take place within several
divisions throughout DHS. Traditionally, this has occurred because division staff have been subject
matter experts on the impacted programs and had the specialized knowledge to oversee the
contracts. Division contract and vendor management teams perform the following functions today,
including:
• Tracking vendor Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).
• Ensuring reports are accurate and timely submitted.
• Sanctioning vendors and taking corrective action when appropriate.
• Communicating with vendors.
• Obtaining, tracking, and storing documentation.
• Monitoring vendor certification and credentials.
• Monitoring compliance to contracts.
• Improving outcomes and delivery.
• Handling complaints.
• Improving efficiency.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 5
Most of these activities occur at the individual contract level, with a focus on the KPIs and
compliance with the contract terms. Some vendor management activities such as vendor
communication and relationship building currently are being performed. However, few activities deal
with identifying risk and value-based outcome monitoring. Through work sessions and interviews
with DHS’s division staff and leadership, some of the contract and vendor management processes
were discussed and mapped. Figure 2 provides a high-level workflow of the central process Office of
Procurement follows when there is a performance issue; Figures 3-6 provide examples of division
contract oversight and monitoring activities.
Figure 2 – DHS Office of Procurement Workflow – Poor Performance Scenario
Source: Developed with DHS staff on 06/10/24.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 6
Figure 3 – Division of County Operations Contract Monitoring Workflow
Source: Source: Developed with DHS staff on 06/10/24.
Figure 4 – Division of Child and Family Services Contract Monitoring Workflow
Source: Developed with DHS staff on 06/10/24.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 7
Figure 5 – DHS Maintenance and Operations (IT) Contract Monitoring Workflow
Source: Source: Developed with DHS staff on 06/10/24.
Figure 6 – Home and Community-Based Services and Human Development Centers Contract
Monitoring Workflow
Source: Developed with DHS staff on 06/10/24.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 8
Some of observations about the current process include:
• Contract management is not centralized nor are staff solely dedicated to contract
management duties. Divisions use a variety of staff for contract management and in most
cases, they are not only focused on contract management. DHS divisions also manage their
own contracts, which can result in variances in process and outcomes. As examples:
o The Division of County Operations relies on a combination of staff and provider feedback
to identify issues with vendors instead of a more proactive monitoring process. If
necessary, DCO collaborates with the vendor to cure any issues.
o The Division of Children and Family Services monitors monthly financial reports and spot
checks vendors to determine if they are meeting expectations.
o The Office of Information Technology reviews the vendors KPI’s, assesses associated
penalties, and conducts User Acceptance Test perform changes before moving into
production.
• The Home and Community Based Services operates an Incident Management System
(HCBS-IMS) which can be used to report health and safety issues, abuse, neglect, or
exploitation.
• DFA collects damages since DHS does not have an account to deposit recoveries. The
process for withholding money varies by division.
• There is no contract management IT system or platform, the workflow is either manual or
utilizes spreadsheets. Use of a standard system could support process standardization and
documentation across divisions.
• There is a focus on timeliness and appropriateness of paperwork submitted. Many of the
oversight activities are ‘checking the box’ exercises.
• There is little training for those performing vendor management, especially around value-
based purchasing arrangements.
• OP supports solicitation, reviews qualifications, obtains bids, and removes bids that do not
meet minimum requirements. Inferior performance issues discovered are referred to OP, who
conducts research, drafts corrective action letters, which are reviewed by the appropriate
division, and sends letters to vendor. The division is responsible for verifying if there are
improvements needed to prevent remedial actions. Remedial actions include correction
action letter, withholding payments, requesting a refund, stop work order, or termination.
• Like contract monitoring, grants monitoring is done by the appropriate division. The focus is
on monitoring the spending and compliance with the terms of the grant. The division may, if
necessary, provide training and has regular calls with the grantee.
Rationale: DHS is steadfast in its responsibly to deliver high-quality, effective, and efficient
services. Since DHS purchases numerous services, it is imperative that DHS operates a successful
contract and vendor management system.
This system’s goals are to monitor and evaluate the adequacy and appropriateness of services and
pursue opportunities to improve outcomes, as well as employee, provider, client, and public
satisfaction. Examples of activities to achieve this goal include the monitoring of data and
performance measures, compliance with policies and procedures, productivity management,
outcome measurement, results of satisfaction surveys and complaint tracking. The results of these
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 9
activities should be transparent and reported regularly. To accomplish this, a productive
organizational structure with clear, defined roles and functions must be in place.
Implementation Considerations: The DHS Deputy Secretary of Operations and Budget will
oversee implementation of this initiative. Representatives from division contract and management
units will collaborate to complete several actions steps to ensure the success of this initiative.
Appendix A – DHS Work Plan provides the Work Plan containing action steps in the recommended
sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process
identified through interviews and work sessions with DHS staff and review of other state best
practices include:
• Establishing a Contract and Vendor Management Team (CVMT) and appointing a Team
Leader. This team will be responsible for coordinating and facilitating contract and vendor
management throughout the department. Some functionality will be reassigned to the team;
however, other functions will be retained by the divisions due to their subject matter
expertise.
• Identifying what functions to centralize and those that should remain within their current
organization.
• Reviewing and standardizing policies and procedures, making quick changes and
improvements, when necessary.
• Developing employee skillsets in negotiating, vendor management and value-based
procurement.
• Conducting a review and analysis of existing current contracts to identify areas of concern
and facilitate implementation of appropriate changes.
• Adopting a more standardized approach to measuring performance and ensuring KPIs are
identified for each contract.
• Modifying contracts that require new language or measures.
• Working with TSS to either purchase or build an enterprise contract management tool. Some
of the data entry and reporting could be an activity of the CVMT.
• Developing a cadence of vendor management meetings, especially for PASSE, ARKids,
ARHOME, PACE, child placement agencies, CMHCs, or any program that reimburses on a
bundle or aggregated rate.
• Developing a risk assessment methodology to identify contractors or vendors who are at risk
of not delivering value. This is a proactive approach that can identify issues or concerns
before they escalate.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
The success of the initiative will be dependent on identifying and mitigating risks. The following are
risks identified to date:
• New positions not available in budget: Reallocate resources to this function or repurpose
through open vacant positions. Identify and capture improved fiscal impact (expected
savings or revenue from contractor penalties) which can be used to fund new positions in the
future in a manner that is cost neutral.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 10
• State not able to build team with requisite skills: Mitigate by early identification of needed
roles and skills and creating a talent acquisition plan.
• Contractors may not agree to added terms and amendments: Mitigate by building a team
with experience negotiating with large vendors, pre-emptively establish division’s stance and
implement, and consistently prepare for re-procurement if current vendors not amenable to
terms. Terminations or re-procurement may be necessary. Mitigate by ensuring that
transition plans are in place and up to date.
• May experience resistance from and friction with vendors: Mitigate by being transparent and
implementing an effective communication plan.
• Misaligned incentives may arise between department and vendors: Mitigate through
strategies such as withholding a portion of payment to achievement of long-term outcomes,
accurate data collection, or overachieving.
Some other state examples of contract management practices are summarized in Figure 7.
Figure 7 – Examples of State Government Contract Management Strategies
State Example
Manages health plans by meeting with them monthly. Each meeting is on a specific
topic, which repeat every three months (topics include: 1) finance and health cost
drivers; 2) operational business requirements such as call times, caseloads,
Rhode Island response times, or prior authorization timelines; and 3) health care and other
expected outcomes. This process has been going on for years and has proved to be
successful. Plans are highly ranked, and Rhode Island’s managed care programs
have been recognized for their achievements.
Massachusetts, like most states, has standard terms and conditions in their
contracts, but what it really sought was best value. Sometimes cost is important,
other times it is the benefit to the consumers. Obtaining customers’ thoughts and
understanding their needs, along with those of the contracts and vendors helps
Massachusetts realize success but can be consuming. Massachusetts used third-party software to
seek feedback from and about vendor performance, as well as requesting
information from those having experience with the vendors. Capturing this
information helped them better manage their vendors, reduce staff burden, and
realize better results.
The Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts is required by law to provide for a Vendor
Performance Tracking System (VPTS). This system evaluates vendor performance
Texas and affects the vendor’s suitability for state contracting. The VPTS provides state
agencies and units with a system to evaluate and reevaluate vendors. This
centralized tool helps to reduce risk and track unsatisfactory results.
Wyoming Medicaid had a third-party contract to provide population health services.
Ten percent of the contract is tied to achieving better outcomes. There were ten
outcomes that were based on HEDIS measures and other outcomes such as
Wyoming
reducing the number of jaundice babies’ re-admissions and emergency room visits.
Achieving these outcomes helped improve the health of the entire Medicaid
population.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 11
Recommended steps for establishing a centralized contract unit (future state):
Phase 1
• Create a contract and vendor management team and charter that includes representatives
from all divisions purchasing services which meets on a regular basis.
• Finalize team structure for new unit or team and create position requests.
• Hire or assign team lead for new unit.
• Complete hiring or re-assignment of all team members for new unit.
• Determine what functions will be centralized vs maintained in divisions.
• Diagnose current contracts, identify major pain points, and develop detailed implementation
plan.
• Work with DFA to establish collection, budgeting, and spending instruments for damages.
• Work with DIS and OSP to scope technology needs for contract management system and
decide buy/build.
• Work with OSP to identify and plan for upcoming contract renewals to introduce new
performance guarantees and key performance indicators.
• Complete contract teardown and determine what would benefit by enterprise procurement
and vendor management.
• Complete contract teardown to understand existing performance and uplift levers.
• Determine process to identify if contracts tasks and/or functions are eligible for enhance
federal funding.
• Develop standardized policies and procedures for contract and vendor management.
Phase 2
• Determine KPIs for new unit and establish measurement mechanisms; if possible, conduct
first round of measurement.
• Develop a template for reporting contract and vendor requirement metrics, outcomes, and
issues that all parties complete; yet allows for individual business units to obtain additional
information.
• Examine and develop risk assessment tools.
• Determine what additional tools could assist in contract/vendor management.
• Execute new contracts, monitor performance of vendors, and regularly measure KPIs to drive
continuous improvement of new unit.
• Develop training in negotiating and in managing value-based contracts.
• Develop vendor and customer survey tools.
• Set up standard meetings with keep vendors. Determine who within DHS should attend, take
minutes and attendance, and communicate to stakeholders.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative seeks to
deploy existing contract management staff resources more efficiently under a centralized shared
services vision within DHS. A team lead and team members will need to be identified. There will be
additional information technology needs to support contract/vendor management system and
survey tools. Third party contractors may be needed but a percentage of the funding should be
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 12
eligible for enhanced federal match. The cost estimate varies depending on whether DHS builds or
purchases this technology.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: DHS will
need to prioritize changes to policies, procedures, and information system changes. DHS will also
need to develop training materials in association with any changes. Centralization of contract
monitoring may result in greater process standardization, which will require policies and procedures
to be updated. There will also be a need to establish and adhere to standardized DHS meetings and
vendor meetings by creating agendas and assigning a scribe to take minutes. Subject matter experts
will need to collaborate with the contract/vendor management staff to provide the expertise that may
not be available with the Contract/Vendor Monitoring Team. Additional measures will be collected
and tracked, and vendor relations meetings will increase.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: This initiative is expected
to result in greater standardization of contract monitoring across DHS. Milestones for this project
include:
• Formation of a Team and identification of a lead and team members for the contract/vendor
oversight unit.
• Design and implementation of a contract management system that collects measurable
performance factors.
Metrics that will demonstrate success include:
• The percentage of service contracts with defined performance guarantees and liquidated
damages (expected to increase);
• Collections amounts (calculated quarterly) (expected to increase over time);
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: DHS estimates indicate this initiative has the potential to generate an $11.0 million
positive revenue impact (cost savings or revenue generation) within twelve months of launch. This
savings estimate is approximately 10% of the total expenditures at DHS for its largest 100 contracts.
The estimate is based on the assumption that enhanced contract monitoring will increase the
identification and collection of penalties and damages, which are not otherwise collected today.
Moreover, the centralization and increased skill-set of the team will improve the quality of contract
development and allow DHS to identify additional federal enhanced matching opportunities for
some of these large technology projects.
Change Management Plan:
The formation of a contract/vendor management team with a Team lead, as well as the development
of clear and concise policies, procedures, and training combined with innovative technologies will
improve DHS’s ability to oversee, monitor, and manage vendors and contractors. This will be
augmented by subject matter experts from the divisions and by increasing and improving
communication with contractors, vendors, and DHS customers. Key activities and timing for the
communication plan are summarized in Figure 8 and included in Appendix A – Work Plan. DHS can
leverage the DHS communications team as well as language guides and resources to ensure
communications are meaningful and person-centered.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 13
Figure 8 – DHS-1 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• Internal DHS • DHS is building the internal capabilities • Policy Memo Misty
Division Staff to better monitor vendors and • Face-to-face Eubanks
• DHS Shared contractors. meetings
Services • DHS will implement the safeguards • Staff emails
Communications needed to ensure compliance and • Teleconference
Team improvement.
• Clear statement of which functions will
be centralized vs. retained in divisions.
• Assurances to division leadership
regarding responsiveness to their
concerns and inclusion of feedback.
• Collaboration will assist in fulfilling this
initiative.
• Summary of performance measures
and expected outcomes, when
available.
• If a new IT tool is adopted, messaging
will include information on the timeline
and training and other resources.
• Post-implementation, presenting
results of new measures and outcomes
to keep internal staff engaged.
External Stakeholders: • DHS is building the internal capabilities • Website Misty
• Public to better monitor vendors and updates Eubanks
• Individuals/benefi contractors. • Email updates
ciaries • DHS will implement the safeguards to stakeholder
• Medical Providers needed to ensure compliance and email lists
improvement. • Live updates in
• Youth and child
• Collaboration will assist in fulfilling this stakeholder
welfare
initiative. meetings/other
organizations
• Summary of performance measures public forums
• Health Plans and expected outcomes, when
• PASSE entities available.
• Child Care • Post-implementation, presenting
Provider results of new measures and outcomes
• SNAP Providers to keep internal staff engaged.
• Other public
assistance state
agencies
• Other public
assistance
vendors and
contactors
• TSS
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 14
Initiative DHS #2 - Redesigned customer service capabilities and staffing model
This initiative seeks to establish a Consumer Service Center/solution to provide prompt, accurate,
and consistent information regarding DHS programs, questions, and concerns and more efficiently
and seamlessly match DHS beneficiaries with appropriate services and support. In doing so, this
initiative will also result in a more efficient staffing model to address beneficiary questions and
improve the beneficiary experience while reducing redundant costs. DHS’s ultimate goal with this
initiative is to use technology to build a more “virtual” call center/consumer services solution that
reinforces DHS’ “No Wrong Door” approach for all DHS beneficiaries and integrates with the
LAUNCH platform that initially is focused on employment/employers.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DHS currently has multiple contact points for
beneficiaries and families withing its own staff and operates contact and call centers 1 with multiple
programmatic service vendors and their supporting software platforms.
• Vendor-operated DHS call center responsible for answering beneficiary questions, issues
and concerns. Some example functions include, but are not limited to, answers questions
related to Arkansas Health and Opportunity For Me (ARHOME) Waiver, provides information
about mental health and substance abuse service providers, sends ConnectCare program
information and assigns or changes primary care physician (PCP) to beneficiary relationship,
connects families who are involved with the Division of Children and Family Services (DCFS)
to resources, accepts and processes enrollment, disenrollment and reenrollment requests
from Life360 providers, and transfers Medicaid, Supplemental Nutritional Assistance
Program (SNAP) and Transitional Employment Assistance (TEA) application assistance to the
appropriate DHS divisions and entity.
• DHS staff across multiple areas conduct operational support activities generated from calls,
many within the Fiscal Agent and DHS Medicaid operations, including the Enrollment Broker
Contact Center. DCO also addresses questions related to universal caseloads, which can
be coordinated through a more centralized customer service approach.
The current system can often create a siloed, confusing and frustrating experience for Medicaid and
other DHS beneficiaries and DHS staff as they navigate multiple contact numbers and touchpoints
within DHS Medicaid. Moreover, current vendor call agents are unable to view a complete record of
the beneficiary’s previous interactions with DHS. There is also no unified record of DHS
communications among platforms, which creates inefficiencies, can result in provision of conflicting
or incomplete information, and causes confusion for beneficiaries. Multiple vendor platform
environments currently exist and this also creates inefficient staffing models and redundant costs.
Some of the pain points for beneficiaries identified by DHS include:
• Beneficiary experience prone to errors driven by multiple disconnected channels and manual
touchpoints;
• Multiple entry points and unique web portals cause confusion for beneficiaries and create
operational challenges because they are not linked;
1
The vision for this initiative is move from a “call center” model to a more customer service-focused, holistic
approach to addressing beneficiary needs known as a “customer service center.”
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 15
• Manual beneficiary contact and communication tracking that creates silos of information
that are not centrally accessible to fiscal agents and state staff;
• Limited self-service options that create additional and unnecessary calls;
• Beneficiaries receive communications from multiple entities’ and,
• Beneficiaries may not receive the most accurate information due to data access, quality,
timing and synchronization.
Rationale: This initiative recommends that DHS redesign its customer service capabilities and
operating model, toward a person/family-centered
approach, as shown at right. To ultimately create a “No
Wrong Door” customer service approach with all DHS
beneficiaries, DHS will need a solution that consolidates
enterprise-wide communications across DHS functional
areas, supported by well-trained and knowledgeable staff
using a common technology platform. This way, contact
center staff, DHS staff, and any other DHS vendor staff, as
designated by DHS, will all have access to the same
information to save time and avoid duplication. Answers to
queries will be consistent, reliable, and not redundant. DHS
will move from a fragmented and decentralized beneficiary
service environment to a streamlined and integrated
environment with unified contact and operations support.
This new innovative Customer Service Center/solution would include the following components:
1. A call center with enhanced customer service capabilities;
2. Mobile-friendly website development and management to make information readily
available and easily accessible to beneficiaries;
3. Multiple avenues of contact operated and resolved by a single vendor;
4. A Customer Relations Management (CRM) platform that gives visibility for DHS into all client
interactions to ensure quality of communications; and,
5. Training materials and programs for all customer service staff designed to make the staff
experts on programs and reduce the need over time for calls to be transferred to DHS internal
division staff.
DHS should rely on the vendor community to help design and develop this innovative and integrated
customer service solution. Planning should be done in coordination with the statewide LAUNCH
platform and the approach should ensure alignment between state departments, as applicable.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A provides the Work Plan containing action steps in
the recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with DHS staff and best
practices in other states have been incorporated in these recommendations.
The Customer Service Center solution would expand upon the current call center contract and
include additional components that would allow for more integrated and centralized communication
support to beneficiaries. Based on historical call volume data, DHS is estimating an annual triage
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 16
volume of over 690,000 calls. Today, many of these calls are routed to DHS divisional subject matter
expert staff. With fully trained and skilled Customer Service Center staff, having the technology and
tools available to operate in a more seamless and customer-centric environment, DHS internal staff
will be able to focus more other important day-to-day operational issues while the department
receives the benefit of enhancing the overall customer experience.
The initial recommendation is for the Customer Service Center to take over existing call center
services and be able to expand to address beneficiary inquiries in other service areas such as:
• Adult Developmental Day Treatment • Durable Medical Equipment
• Early Intervention Day Treatment • Family Planning and Pregnancy
• Occupational, Speech and Physical related services
Therapies, • Dental Fee For Service
• PACE Program • Dental Managed Care
• Early and Periodic Screening • Behavioral Health Counseling
Diagnosis and Treatment (EPSDT) • Autism Waiver
• Home Health • Personal Care Services
• Hospital Services • Private Duty Nursing
• Independent Choices Waiver • Targeted Case Management
• Living Choices Waiver • Skilled Nursing Facilities
This would also enable a more efficient and effective service delivery that truly optimizes the DHS
beneficiary experience.
The initiative would be supported through various DHS beneficiary channels that may include but are
not limited to interactions by telephone, text capabilities, mobile friendly websites, development of
customer service knowledge, predictive call routing, and interactive voice response. In-person
channels should also be explored that could include visits to DHS County offices, which could be
captured and entered into a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) solution. The solution would
also include Artificial Intelligence (AI) capabilities that are integrated into the call distribution, a
knowledge base, chat bots, and other features. Intelligent search function capabilities must be part
of the infrastructure platform, including AI to perform natural language searches (in English, Spanish,
and Marshallese, if available) of knowledge content. The solution would ensure that there is an
integrated beneficiary experience across DHS program divisions and beneficiary channels, including
providing the call agents with a history of interactions via the CRM.
Customer Service Center support staff will need to be well-trained, qualified, and competent to
address the many beneficiary inquiries, and there will need to be a very detailed Service Level
Agreement (SLA) with the vendor that assures a baseline staffing solution that supports all the
Customer Service Center responsibilities. This would include, but not limited to, providing sufficient
baseline staff to support beneficiary contacts (i.e., calls, emails, texts, chat, and secure message)
with escalation and ticket resolution processes to meet the requirements of the SLA. DHS should
also assure that the vendor chosen has agreed to increase staffing levels when needed to support
peak volumes to meet the requirements of the SLA and allow for a decrease of resources as needed
based on volume reductions.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 17
There is an opportunity for DHS to receive an enhanced federal Medicaid match for state information
technology expenditures that improve access to covered Medicaid services, including access to
mental health and substance abuse disorder treatment and care coordination. 2 CMS recently issued
an Informational Bulletin that reminded state Medicaid agencies how to apply for enhanced
Medicaid matching rates for these types of technology expenditures and the Customer Service
Center Platform envisioned by DHS should qualify for 90% enhanced Medicaid funding for both
design, development and implementation, and 75% for on-going maintenance. DHS should submit
an Advanced Planning Document (APD) to obtain prior approval from CMS for the enhanced match.
DHS should also collaborate with the Department of Transformation and Shared (TSS) services as it
prepares to implement, as part of an Arkansas Forward initiative, the statewide data hub that will
increase the efficiency and comprehensiveness of government services, enhance the cohesiveness
of Arkansan experience, and make use of leading technologies that improve business process
efficiency and lower costs. DHS may want to require its chosen vendor to have the future capability
of interfacing with the TSS data hub to support the implementation of the envisioned government
services portal.
In addition to these considerations, several government entities have developed successful
customer service centers and online resources as part of “No Wrong Door” solutions and to support
beneficiary self-service which has a positive impact on satisfaction and reduces the operational
impact to the agencies.
Tennessee
Tennessee Department of Human Services (DHS) implemented a new call center model in 2020. This
was an outsourced solution and included staffing support, technology augmentation, and overall
modernization. DHS implemented the new call center mode to help it execute duties related to
emergency benefits administration and increased call volume (which increased by over 12,600% in
2020). Some of the technology augmentation included self-service functionality and a portal for
parents and schools. The contact center implementation also included a cloud-based telephony
platform, which enabled enhanced call routing, IVR messaging, and statistical tracking of call types
and volumes. 3
Washington State Department of Social and Health Services
The Washington Department of Social and Health Services has a Customer Service Center called
“Contact DSHS.” It offers similar call center functionality to the San Diego model and has staff
available to address questions related to the full array of benefits and services.4 However,
2
See CMCS Informational Bulletin, Accessing Enhanced Federal Medicaid Matching Rates for State
Information Technology Expenditures to Improve Access to Mental Health and Substance Use Disorder
Treatment and Care Coordination, https://mcusercontent.com/c0cc0bb7d7ade9649fb1ad184/
files/48f5acca-9845-f233-d0d3-9680964ed22e/cib06142024_0.pdf.
3
State of Tennessee Department of Finance and Administration, “The State of Tennessee’s
Department of Human Services Call Center Transformation,” 2022 NASCIO award submission,
https://www.nascio.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/TN_ICT-Innovations.pdf.
4
Washington State Department of Social and Health Services, “Contact DSHS,”
https://www.dshs.wa.gov/contact-dshs.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 18
Washington has also designed the Service Center to allow for self-navigation through the
“Washington Connections” website, where individuals find services, apply for benefits, create an
account, watch a video, determine if they might qualify for benefits. 5
Iowa Department of Human Services
Iowa DHS recently submitted an APD to CMS for enhanced Medicaid funding for information
technology that will support the Governor’s THRIVE initiative, a referral management solution, where
closed loop referral technology will be used by navigators and care coordinators to refer individuals
and families in need to services, including low/no-cost community and faith-based services.6
San Diego County
San Diego County has The Access Customer Service Call Center. This Call Center adopts a similar
No Wrong Door solution and is an extension of the County of San Diego Family Resource Centers
(FRCs). The call center serves residents, providers, and other government agencies with questions
or needs related to Family Resource Center programs and services, including providing case
management services for existing FRC customers countywide. The Access customer service
representatives are experienced eligibility workers and are trained in the state and county Medicaid
and Human Service programs, such as CalWORKs, CalFresh, and Medi-Cal programs.
The Access call center staff attempt to address the caller’s issues on the first call (First Call
Resolution) and, among other things, are able to help callers with:
• Reporting changes and updates to case information
• Finding out the status of an application or case
• Requesting forms, packets, applications
• Applying for benefits
There is a Customer Experience Survey online, where individuals can let the County know about their
experience with a Call Center agent. They have the choice to submit their experience through the
website or by visiting the county office.
There are also several ways a caller can self-serve to obtain case information and access services
without having to speak with a Service Center staff, such as:
• Apply for services, upload required documentation and access case information via the
BenefitsCal.com website.
• Apply for supplemental nutrition assistance program benefits (formerly known as food
stamps) via GetCalFresh.org website (maintained by a third party).
• Submit documents and other verifications to San Diego County to support CalFresh,
MediCal, or CALWORKS case via LaterDocs website
(https://www.sandiegocounty.gov/content/sdc/hhsa/programs/ssp/LaterDocs.html).
5
Washington Connection, https://www.washingtonconnection.org/home/.
6
Iowa Office of the Governor, “Supporting the Health and Well-being of Iowans,”
https://governor.iowa.gov/vision-iowa-0/supporting-health-and-well-being-iowans.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 19
• Obtain electronic benefit transfer (EBT) card information such as account balance,
transaction history, and claim balance at the state’s EBT website:
https://www.ebtproject.ca.gov/.
Callers can opt to receive text messages through the Access Call Center. When citizens visit the
Access Call Center website, 7 they can obtain a detailed resource guide and listing that interfaces
with San Diego County 211 and offers the caller information on available non-county government
additional community social services, such as housing assistance, food and nutrition assistance and
programs for children and families. 8
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
The success of the initiative will be dependent on identifying risks and mitigating these risks. The
following are risks identified:
• The Customer Service Center vendor chosen will need to have a range of qualifications and
capabilities that include state of the art technology and functionality, a CRM that has the
hardware, software and tracking capabilities to ensure real time transfer of important data
regarding client interactions, and staff that are well-trained and continuously updated on all
major Medicaid program changes. Some of these DHS programs are complex and there will
need to be detailed training and continuous quality assurance to assure that the Service
Center support staff are continuously providing consistent and reliable information. There
will need to be the development of training manuals and connection to division knowledge
libraries and staff to truly understand program initiatives. The vendor chosen will need to
conduct all aspects of the contract in a timely, efficient, productive, consistent, courteous,
and professional manner as they will be representatives of DHS.
• Expanding vendor responsibilities to areas previously not outsourced can be a risk, however
that risk can be mitigated successfully with an accountable and well-structured
performance-based contract that is effectively managed by DHS vendor staff. Initiative DHS-
1 seeks to create a more accountable vendor management system at DHS, which will be
important to ensuring the overall success of this initiative.
• There are also risks involved with the design of any new technology and, delays or concerns
with implementation can often be resolved early with effective and appropriate vendor
project management and state contract management.
• Implementation of AI technology at the Customer Service Center by the vendor introduces
new risk. The rapid advancement of AI has the potential to transform government business
processes, changing how state employees perform their work and ultimately improving
government efficiency. These technologies also pose new and challenging considerations for
implementation. Thus, DHS should continuously monitor other state applications of AI, as
well as application in the Arkansas Customer Service Center. Contract requirements for a
vendor should assure that any virtual customer assistant using AI is able to respond
7
San Diego County, “Access Call Center,”
https://www.sandiegocounty.gov/content/sdc/hhsa/programs/ssp/access.html
8
San Diego County, “Additional Resources page,”
https://www.sandiegocounty.gov/content/sdc/hhsa/programs/ssp/resources.html.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 20
effectively to beneficiary requests similar to a human call center agent. States are now
offering guidelines meant to encourage purposeful and responsible use of generative AI to
foster public trust, support business outcomes, and ensure the ethical, transparent,
accountable, and responsible implementation of this technology. 9 The performance-based
contract would be used as a vehicle with appropriate metrics to assure that AI functionality
meets the goals and objectives of DHS in the contract.
• DHS will need to ensure that the vendor is continuously training its support staff, so they are
updated in real time on any changes to eligibility rules, program rules, service delivery, or the
Medicaid state plan.
• There will be future issues related to interoperability with separate DHS systems related to
eligibility and service delivery. Linkages here may also allow for more efficient interactions
with beneficiaries. The DHS Solution should require vendors to have the ability in the future
for the CRM system to interface with other relevant DHS systems.
• Creation of a true “No Wrong Door” customer service model could be cost-prohibitive.
However, DHS should look to (1) implement digital and self-serve technology that can reduce
operating costs; and (2) continuously monitor ROI of different service interventions and
increase investment in successful models.
• Measuring the customer experience and satisfaction with the Customer Service Center is an
important mechanism to monitor the quality, consistency and reliability of the information
relayed, as well as the overall experience. DHS should consider including in the
specifications for the Service Center a customer experience survey at the end of a call or
experience. This could also be used as a way to monitor the overall performance of the vendor
chosen.
Recommended steps for establishing a Customer Service Center future state:
• Finalize and issue a Request for Information (RFI) where DHS will identify all the functionality
it desires for the Customer Service Center and ask potential industry vendors to specifically
identify how it would implement a staged in approach to both knowledge building for
contractor personnel and implementation of supportive technology
• Draft an Advanced Planning Document (APD) and submit it to CMS for review and approval.
Identify the desired solution in the APD.
• Review responses from RFI and begin to prepare the Request for Proposal (RFP) based on
best vendor-provided solutions and include in the RFP the staged approach to develop
capabilities and roll out the new Customer Service Center.
• Release RFP for Customer Service Center.
• Decide on new Customer Service vendor and establish joint project governance.
• Jointly determine KPIs for new customer service model and establish measurement
mechanisms.
• Develop Operational Readiness Review process.
9
Washington Technology Solutions, Interim Guidelines for Purposeful and Responsible Use of Generative
Artificial Intelligence, Approved August 2023, https://watech.wa.gov/sites/default/files/2023-
09/State%2520Agency%2520Generative%2520AI%2520Guidelines%25208-7-23%2520.pdf.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 21
• Conduct Readiness Review process with vendor, with project governance and management
in place.
• Implement Customer Service Center for the initial phase (“Go Live”).
• Review performance of new Customer Service Center and consider modifications to
operating model.
• Complete implementation of additional customer service capabilities, e.g., all departments
of Arkansas DHS.
• Regularly measure performance across KPIs and continuously improve service model.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative seeks to build
on current call center capabilities and expand to other areas of DHS programs and divisions and also
add enhanced technology, including a new CRM and tools that allow for various modes of
interaction. Because the model presumes a vendor would operate the Customer Service Center,
there are no additional DHS staff that would be required to operate the Customer Service Center and
it is anticipated expanded capabilities of the Center would increase beneficiary self-service,
reducing the number of referrals made to division staff. It is anticipated this would free up
department staff time to be applied toward other duties. This initiative may also result in the need to
reallocate existing positions to project management and management of community partnerships.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: DHS will
need to work closely with Customer Service Center staff to assure there is a seamless transition to
addressing a wider range of beneficiary questions and issues. There will also need to be a seamless
process to communicate statutory, rule, and policy changes to the vendor to ensure they have the
most accurate and updated information to address the concerns. DHS may look to assign a shared
service staff member to coordinate these efforts.
For contract management, DHS will need to work with the DHS Office of Procurement to ensure an
enhanced process is established to monitor the vendor, including establishment of policies and
procedures for continuous contract monitoring. The contract requirements should outline
Compliance and Security standards and an operational readiness review process where DHS would
outline a checklist of requirements for the vendor to meet prior to “Go Live” (i.e., a problem escalation
process, a security plan, and disaster recovery and business continuity plan). The contract should
include clear SLAs. After “Go Live,” contract monitoring staff should validate the vendor’s
performance on SLAs and in accordance with the updated policies and procedures for vendor
management.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
performance measures of this initiative include:
• Percentage of calls with first contact resolution
• Number/percentage of calls with referrals to DHS staff
• Average handle time
• Average speed of answer
• Utilization of IVR and other self-service resolutions
• Volume of citizens served through community partners
• Customer satisfaction at various touchpoints across the beneficiary journey
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 22
The expected impact would be improved customer service levels; efficiency savings due to freeing
up time for DHS staff to focus on other day to day operations; and, reduced benefits spend where
the contact leads to resolution of the issue, reduction in risk level and referral to other non-
government community-based solutions to promote independence and self-sufficiency.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: The current contract value for the AFMC call center is approximately $23.4 million.
Due to the requirements of the new contract, the future contract value is estimated by DHS to be
approximately double the current contract. In addition, DHS may encounter additional information
technology needs due to potential system updates and interoperability with the vendor’s CRM.
These costs are indeterminable at present.
DHS has identified approximately $45.0 million of savings within two years of this initiative launch.
This is due primarily to cost avoidance measures resulting in reduced benefits expenditures where
the contact leads to resolution of the issue, reduction in risk level, introduction of self-service
technology to reduce operation costs, and referral to other non-government community-based
solutions to promote independence and self-sufficiency.
Change Management Plan:
Development of clear and concise policies, procedures, and training combined with innovative
technologies will improve DHS’s ability to resolve beneficiary and family issues and concerns. Key
activities and timing for the communication plan are included in Appendix A – Work Plan and
summarized below in Figure 9.
Figure 9 – DHS-2 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
DHS internal staff, • The State of Arkansas can • Staff face-to- Melissa Weatherton to
including County realize significant benefits with face lead team, to include:
Eligibility Operations new and innovative customer meetings • Mary Franklin
call center and self-navigation • Town halls • Elizabeth Pitman
technologies, including • Emails • Gavin Lesnick
introduction of AI, including • Jeff Dean
government efficiency,
financial cost avoidance and
improving the customer
experience
• DHS will implement the
safeguards needed to ensure
accountability of the customer
service center vendor’s entire
operations
• Improved collaboration
between a vendor and DHS will
improve beneficiary self-
service, which is expected to
reduce referrals to DHS and
allow staff to focus on other
duties
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 23
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• There will be direct
collaboration with all DHS
divisions and their staff
• Current and future • DHS is partnering with a vendor • Press release Melissa Weatherton to
Beneficiaries and to launch a customer service • Website lead team, to include:
their families center better able to answer Updates • Mary Franklin
(customer) beneficiary questions • Interactive • Elizabeth Pitman
• Individuals at risk • Self-service functionality will voice • Gavin Lesnick
of need for DHS now allow beneficiaries to do response • Jeff Dean
programs and [describe new functions] • Beneficiary
services • Process and timeline for letters
accessing these resources • Beneficiaries
text
messages
• Legislature • The State of Arkansas can • Legislative Melissa Weatherton to
• External realize significant benefits with staff lead team, to include:
stakeholders (i.e., new and innovative customer briefings/ • Mary Franklin
providers) call center and self-navigation Presentations • Elizabeth Pitman
technologies, including • Stakeholder • Gavin Lesnick
introduction of AI, including meetings • Jeff Dean
government efficiency,
financial cost avoidance and
improving the customer
experience
• DHS will implement the
safeguards needed to ensure
accountability of the customer
service center vendor’s entire
operations [Include greater
detail on vendor requirements
and contract monitoring and
oversight]
• Improved collaboration
between a vendor and DHS will
improve beneficiary self-
service, which is expected to
reduce referrals to DHS and
allow staff to focus on other
duties
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 24
Initiative DHS #3 - Increase awareness of Home and Community Based Services
This initiative seeks to increase awareness of Home and Community Based Services (HCBS) through
distribution of educational materials, enhancements to customer service capabilities, community
partnerships, and communication channels to help beneficiaries make an informed choice for their
long-term care options. The primary goal of the initiative is to ensure individuals and families have
consistent, accurate, meaningful information regarding the availability of HCBS waiver programs and
services available in the State with which to use in making decisions.
Initiative Overview and Current State: This initiative is one of several DHS efforts to expand,
enhance, and strengthen HCBS waiver services statewide. DHS is in the process of actively
implementing this initiative, with new resources developed and an external stakeholder campaign
launched in June 2024.
This initiative was developed after an assessment of current education and training efforts at DHS
related to the promotion of HCBS waiver services statewide. The contractor employed to do the
assessment reviewed existing materials and solicited stakeholder input via a series of interview
sessions and a stakeholder survey to identify whether there were gaps in stakeholder, consumer and
provider education, knowledge and training around HCBS.
The key HCBS waiver services included in this initiative are:
• Autism Waiver
• Arkansas Choices in Homecare Waiver
• Independent Choices
• Living Choices Assisted Living Waiver
• Community and Employment Supports Waiver
• Private Duty Nursing
• Personnel Care Services
• State Plan Behavioral Health Services
• Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE) Waiver
The key stakeholders assessed were those serving specialty populations that utilize HCBS programs
in the State, including individuals with developmental disabilities, individuals with physical
disabilities, older adults, and those with functional deficits due to their behavioral health needs. The
stakeholder groups consisted of the following:
• Beneficiaries and their families
• Internal DHS divisions
• Providers and case managers
• Provider-Led Shared Services Entity (PASSE) providers
• Community Partners – (schools, Area Agencies on Aging)
The Assessment was completed in May 2023 and offered insights shared by DHS staff and external
stakeholders to describe existing assets, critical challenges and key opportunities to enhance HCBS
education efforts.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 25
Rationale: Key findings of the assessment provide rationale for the Initiative. 10 The results showed
that there was need for more effective HCBS education and training across the board. They were as
follows:
1. Limited collaboration across the divisions responsible for HCBS and a lack of internal
training processes, contributing to variation in HCBS educational materials and possible
duplication of efforts.
2. Beneficiaries report existing education materials can be difficult to understand, causing
confusion for families and beneficiaries when navigating the waiver application process and
also understanding the care they are eligible to receive.
3. Multiple beneficiary families reported being unaware of program services benefits and
resources available to support their needs.
4. There is not a clearly defined training plan or ownership for HCBS provider education.
5. Training and educational materials for providers can be difficult to interpret and access and
sometimes lack clarity.
6. Providers have reported the need for consistent guidance and enhanced technical support
from DHS to best equip providers to deliver services.
7. For the PASSE and Care Coordinators, it can be time consuming and challenging to identify
providers to deliver a beneficiary’s services due to a lack of clarity and guidance on each
provider’s service delivery arrangements.
8. Stakeholders have highlighted the importance of preventative HCBS services and engaging
other entities involved in the HCBS system.
Based on the input, the survey results and a review of best practices seen in other states,
recommendations were proposed to DHS as part of an overarching HCBS educational initiative to
ensure that HCBC stakeholders have consistent, accurate, and meaningful information regarding the
HCBS programs and services available. These recommendations involved providing education
materials for individuals and families regarding HCBS programs and eligibility, providing training and
education materials for providers to hopefully increase the number of providers and developing
training materials across all HCBS programs that can help DHS as well. DHS, thereafter, chose to
make this part of the Arkansas Forward initiative. Providers were mostly positive in their experience
but wanted more helpful resources, virtual training sessions and enhanced technical assistance.
In July 2024, DHS launched its Medicaid Home and Community-Based Services (HCBS) Educational
Campaign to empower stakeholders, including beneficiaries and their families, providers, and
internal DHS staff with foundational Medicaid and HCBS information. The campaign includes:
• A dedicated HCBS homepage available at ar.gov/hcbs
• Educational flyers on each HCBS program (for example, ARChoices waiver, the PASSEs,
Personal Care), also available at ar.gov/hcbs. The flyers aim to enhance awareness of HCBS
programs and ensure that program requirements, benefits, and resources are clearly
presented.
10
During the Assessment conducted by Guidehouse, there were over 321 stakeholders surveyed, including
114 HCBS Clients, PASSE members and caregivers, 199 HCBS providers, and 9 Advocacy groups.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 26
The team will also issue news releases, email blasts, and socials media posts to promote these
resources.
Implementation Considerations: Attachment A – DHS Work Plan provides the action steps in
the recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. DHS has launched
implementation of this initiative, including developing the “one pagers” for stakeholders about the
services that are available through the HCBS programs statewide, along with its benefit structure and
how to apply, and launching its communication effort with stakeholders to make them aware of
resources.
Considerations for the implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with
DHS staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Ensure that all written one pagers or material available through the DHS website or
stakeholders undergo review on a standard basis to ensure accuracy of information and
incorporation of any key changes to HCBS program eligibility and/or service array.
• Use input from stakeholders to ensure that the HCBS educational and training materials use
simplified language, address current gaps, and avoid jargon and clinical language. For
example, survey findings found many families do not understand the term “1915(c) waiver.”
Complex language can distract from the intention of the information, and it is important to
use phrases and terminology that resonate with beneficiaries.
• Ensure contact information remains current and available in rural areas, possibly through
community organizations to underserved populations.
• Ensure that the “one pagers” are framing the services in a way that highlights and focuses on
how HCBS programs can benefit the beneficiary and family. This includes putting a “face” to
HCBS to make the benefits/impacts real and tangible.
• Ensure that the “one pagers” also address the gap in not understanding the application
process. Individuals can sometimes get lost in the number of questions and documentation
requirements that are required prior to determining eligibility. Step-by-step guidance, such
as a process workflow for the application process, including steps, timeframes, and
expectations is desirable.
• Ensure that there is clear understanding in service delivery decisions so that beneficiaries
understand why they are not receiving the same level of services as another beneficiary.
• The “one pagers” should specifically describe the array of services and resources so that
beneficiary families are fully informed about the array of related medical and recreational
programs that are available to families.
• Include providers and case managers in the review of important beneficiary communications
because they regularly interact with beneficiaries and can better ensure the beneficiary
receives the information.
• Use the Division of County Operations (DCO) offices to serve as learning/resource centers
for beneficiaries in more rural areas especially if individuals are not able to access online
resources.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 27
• Conduct regular feedback sessions to understand the effectiveness of the “one pagers” in
helping to educate individuals and families about the HCBS programs and eligibility process
and criteria, including clarity of messaging.
• Periodically measure awareness and utilization drivers in populations using HCBS waiver
services through surveys.
• Monitory continuously any changes in HCBS statute, rules, or policy and ensure that any
updates to beneficiary materials are made expeditiously.
In addition to these considerations, several government entities have invested in educational
materials to support beneficiary enrollment.
Colorado Dept of Health Care Policy and Financing
Colorado developed a comparison chart for the state’s HCBS waivers and PACE program. It provides
a detailed summary of each program’s eligibility requirements, costs, and waitlist processes. The
document includes an additional detailed Comparison Chart, 11 with information for each program,
including:
• Purpose of program
• Age requirements
• Populations served
• Waiting list
• Where to apply
• Level of care requirements
• Authority to select a service provider
• Waiver or program website
• Case management entities
• Administrative entities
• State contacts
The Comparison Chart serves as a “one-stop” helpful resource for beneficiaries and family members
to differentiate between programs or provide additional information. The level of detail included in
this chart this may be a helpful template for DHS to organize the details of its various programs and
services for internal reference.
Iowa Department of Human Services
Iowa DHS developed “Are Home and Community Based Services Right for You – Iowa,” a HCBS
Waiver Program Brochure to provide a brief overview of the eight HCBS programs to prospective
beneficiaries. The overview details populations that are eligible for services, the benefit of
participating in a waiver program (e.g., easy access, person-centered approach, health and safety,
flexible supports), services that beneficiaries may receive under each program, and resources to
11
Colorado Department of Health Care Policy and Financing, “Colorado Home and Community Based
Services (HCBS) Children’s Waivers Comparison Chart,” March 2024,
https://hcpf.colorado.gov/sites/hcpf/files/HCBS%20Children%27s%20Waivers%20Comparison%20Chart-
March%202024.pdf.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 28
contact for support if needed. Additionally, the Iowa DHS HCBS webpage includes PDF versions of a
brochure for each HCBS waiver program in English and Spanish and outlines other available HCBS
supports. 12
Minnesota Department of Human Services
Minnesota DHS developed “HCBS Waiver and Alternative Care Provider Training 101” 13 which equips
providers with basic information about the State’s programs, operations, policies, and
requirements. The training is housed in an online, self-paced learning center. Topics include:
• The Road to Home and Community Based Services in Minnesota
• Becoming an HCBS Waiver Provider
• Participant safeguards
Minnesota DHS also developed HCBS modules for person-centered organizations that include a
self-paced toolkit with eight training modules focused on person-centered practices. In addition to
the toolkit, DHS created three short videos to highlight excellent providers who demonstrate person-
centeredness in their operations.
Recommended steps for increasing awareness of HCBS programs (future state):
Phase One: Beneficiary Materials
• Develop general Medicaid HCBS educational materials which provide an overview of the
state HCBS programs, including services provided, populations serviced and how program
services support beneficiaries. Coordinate review and approval across program staff.
(complete)
o Ensure clear application instructions and a link to the application process within
these materials.
• Develop a comprehensive communication plan to distribute materials.
• Release HCBC one pagers/enhance educational material online and distribute physical
copies to providers, stakeholders, and internal staff.
• Create mechanism for recurring review and update of materials to keep them current and
ensure they meet stakeholder needs.
• Review orientation and onboarding process to help beneficiaries to ensure understand
available HCBS services and resources.
Phase Two: Provider Education
• Create provider workgroup to begin planning around dissemination of provider education
materials.
• Develop draft provider education “one pagers.”
12
Iowa DHS, “Are Home and Community-Based Services Right for You – Iowa,”
https://hhs.iowa.gov/media/6538/download?inline=.
13
Minnesota DHS, “HCBS Waiver and Alternative Care Provider Training 101,” https://mn.gov/dhs/partners-
and-providers/training-conferences/minnesota-health-care-programs/provider-training/waiver-ac-provider-
training-101.jsp.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 29
• Develop communication plan to distribute materials.
Phase Three: DHS and Provider Training
• Collect provider and internal staff feedback (survey is one potential method to measure) to
identify areas for improved training materials.
• Develop comprehensive training plan across all stakeholders to guide implementation,
identify training needs and identify prioritization for training.
• Develop standard training materials and procedures for HCBS programs.
• Strengthen provider training and technical assistance, create communication channels and
leverage provider partnerships.
• Define DHS training and education role and capacity.
• Develop HCBS education materials to support HCBC provider licensing process.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative has started
with the creation of the initial educational “one pagers” by DHS staff with assistance from a third
party contractor. This initiative is aligned with the DHS overall effort to promote the availability and
access to Medicaid HCBS services statewide. Support will come from existing DHS Medicaid HCBS
waiver staff and staff that are part of the shared services. The DHS Communications team will
identify internally dedicated roles for training and education, whether that is a staff member solely
dedicated to the responsibility or an additional responsibility of an existing staff member.
DHS may look to other states that have dedicated communications and training staff members in
informing its strategies for disseminating information, ensuring a feedback loop between
stakeholders and the department, and increasing utilization of HCBS services. For example, the
Kentucky Department for Medicaid Services has a staff member that develops training materials and
manages the public comment process, reviews documents for language and accessibility, and
manages the agency’s dedicated stakeholder email box.
DHS has promoted its programs through a campaign that includes website updates. There are no
additional Information Technology resources that are needed for this initiative.
Some funding is anticipated to be needed for continued material development, implementation of
surveys, and the delivery of effective provider training. This amount is not anticipated to exceed
$50,000 per year and will be absorbed through current DDS budget.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: DHS will
need to establish process for the ongoing review and approval of HCBS education materials to ensure
their accuracy and a process to incorporate ad hoc changes to HCBS policy, rule, or statute. DHS
may also need to develop training materials related to the HCBS provider education modules
developed.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected impacts of
this initiative are to increase the number of beneficiaries who apply for and are served by the above
HCBS waiver services, allowing them to remain in their communities and at home, as well as increase
the amount, education, knowledge and training of community-based provider partner agencies.
Some of the key performance metrics to measure success of this initiative include:
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 30
• The number of established HCBS community partners with agreements;
• The number of applications for HCBS waiver services;
• The number of beneficiaries who are approved to receive HCBS waiver services increases,
allowing them to remain in their communities;
• The percent utilization of HCBS for new long-term care beneficiaries and other high need
populations;
• The awareness rate of HCBS options for care (to be measured by survey); and,
• Metrics related to views/utilization of communications material across channels.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: DHS has identified approximately $7.0 million in cost avoidance savings to be
realized within two years of this initiative launch. This is due primarily to increased application for
and use of cost-effective home and community-based services, for those who would otherwise be
served in higher cost institutional settings.
Change Management Plan: Development of clear and concise educational materials identifying
clear paths to eligibility and benefits for receiving HCBS services, as well as continued collaboration
with HCBS stakeholders is essential to this initiative’s success. Recommended “one pagers” on
HCBS programs have been developed and a comprehensive stakeholder engagement plan. Key
activities and timing for communication plan are included in Appendix A – Work Plan and
summarized below in Figure 10. DHS can leverage the DHS communications team as well as
language guides and resources to ensure communications are meaningful and person-centered.
Figure 10 – DHS-3 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• Individuals/beneficiaries • Summarizing the • Website content to • Melissa
• Parents/caretakers available HCBS announce availability Weatherton
waiver programs of resources on
• Establishing eligibility HCBS
criteria for programs • HCBS waiver “one
• Outlining the eligibility pagers” in digital and
process hardcopy formats
• Identifying services by • Presentations at
program stakeholder events
• HCBS programs are • Messaging delivered
person-centered and through existing and
exist to provide new community
beneficiaries with the partners (e.g.,
help they need to Arkansas AARP,
complete everyday PCPs, Schools,
activities in the least Higher Education,
restrictive setting AAAs)
• HCBS programs • Emails delivered
empower through stakeholder
parents/guardians to lists
participate in
treatment plans
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 31
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
External Stakeholders: • Summarizing the • Website content to • Melissa
• HCBS Waiver Providers available HCBS announce Weatherton
• HCBS stakeholders and waiver programs availability of
Associations, such as • Establishing eligibility resources on HCBS
ADRC/AARP criteria for programs • HCBS waiver “one
• Medical Providers • Outlining the eligibility pagers” in digital and
• Judges process hardcopy formats
• Attorneys • Identifying services by • Presentations at
• Youth and child welfare program stakeholder events
organizations • Identifying provider • Emails distributed
• Hospitals and discharge and other training through stakeholder
planners resources available lists
• Psychiatric Residential
Treatment Facilities (PRTF)
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 32
Initiative DHS #4 - Restructure Medicaid Operations Under Single Appropriation
This initiative seeks to restructure Medicaid operations within a single appropriation to enable
strategic management of the DHS budget and services across Medicaid-related divisions and
improve the organizational effectiveness and ability to develop and execute strategic priorities to
advance the departmental vision.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DHS oversees human services across the State of
Arkansas. Medicaid is the largest health services program and funding stream and is administered
within DHS through separate divisions (as is done in most states). For example, the Divisions of Aging,
Adult, and Behavioral Health Services and Developmental Disabilities Services administer Medicaid
home and community-based waiver services for eligible seniors, individuals with intellectual and
developmental disabilities, and those at risk of institutionalization. Eligibility determinations are
made by Division of County Operations staff. The Division of Provider Services and Quality
Assurances licenses and certifies Medicaid and long-term care providers and conducts related
quality assurance activities. The Division of Medical Services is the lead administrative agency for
Medicaid and administers the Medicaid program on a day-to-day basis, including, but not limited to,
overseeing the PASSE program, paying fee-for-service claims, determining provider rates, program
benefit coverage and service delivery settings. The Office of Secretary and Deputy Secretary of
Budget and Operations provides executive leadership as well as shared services to the divisions,
such as financial, human resources, procurement and technology.
These divisions are critical to the operations of DHS and enable the Medicaid program to operate
while also delivering other state and federally funded services to populations such as children, and
people in need of mental health and substance abuse services. However, the staff that run all the
division programs are, to some degree, siloed within DHS.
Arkansas practices a hybrid budget approach where it recommends and reviews budgets on a
biennial basis but enacts appropriations before each fiscal year. 14 For each fund account in the
budget, individual appropriation bills establish maximum spending authority for categories of
spending, such as salaries, personal services matching funds, itemized positions, and the operating
expenses of the department. 15 Special language in the appropriation bill may be permissive, such as
allowing transfer of appropriation, funds, positions, and programs, or may be restrictive of certain
actions or require review of the Legislative Council or Joint Budget Committee.
Today, the Arkansas State Legislature makes appropriations to DHS through an appropriation act
specific to each DHS division. Thus, general revenue allocations, like the appropriation acts, provide
funding to each DHS division individually. State funds appropriated to DHS leverage multiple sources
of financing including federal and other funds to support the department’s total appropriation.
For example, out of the $1.8 Billion DHS budget for Fiscal Years 2022 and 2023, the Behavioral Health
Services appropriation is $101,232,260. Behavioral Health funds cannot be transferred from the DHS
14
National Association of State Budget Officers, “Arkansas,”
https://www.nasbo.org/mainsite/resources/proposed-enacted-budgets/arkansas-budget.
15
Arkansas State Legislature, Arkansas General Assembly Revenue Stabilization Law Allocations.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 33
division that oversees behavioral health services to another DHS division within the biennium
without the specific authority of the Legislature.
There is special language in the appropriation for the DHS Secretary’s office provided in HB 1056,
codified in Act 193, that recognizes DHS’ challenges predicting the exact needs for funding by
program and affords DHS limited reallocation of resource authority to adjust DHS division budgets,
so long as it supports the Medicaid program. The Secretary must obtain the approval of the Chief
Fiscal Officer of the state and report quarterly to the Legislative Council or Joint Budget Committee
on Medicaid match transfers. This authority to reallocate resources, however, does not extend to
moving Medicaid dollars out of one division and transferring them to another.
However, there is special language that allows DHS to make inter-agency and inter-divisional
transfers to provide state funds that match federal Medicaid funds for reimbursement of direct
medical services. This allows some flexibility to transfer positions and funds within and between
existing and newly created divisions, offices, sections, and units of DHS, but it is limited to general
funds only and does not extend to Medicaid. As a result, braiding and blending of funding to
administer Medicaid across the Division of Medicaid Services, Division of County Operations,
Division of Provider Services and Quality Assurance, the Division of Developmental Disabilities
Services, the Division of Aging, Adult and Behavioral Health services is limited. The Secretary cannot
share or transfer any Medicaid appropriations across these Medicaid divisions. Instead, the
Secretary must balance and prioritize division-specific appropriations and state general revenue
between Medicaid administrative costs and the expenses of other state and federally funded
services they provide. This creates inflexibility in the Secretary’s responsibility for leadership and
oversight of the entire department’s efforts in supporting the health and well-being of all Arkansans,
especially those in most need.
Rationale: Medicaid enrollment fluctuates, new federal and state policies are considered and
implemented, and beneficiary needs are dynamic. However, resources to manage these dynamics
are fixed through individual appropriations and funding, which limits how DHS can deploy staff and
focus financial resources. Reallocation of positions and funding from Medicaid to these divisions
does not occur. Medicaid match transfers between divisions to fund Medicaid medical services
payments highlight both the interdependencies of the DHS division budgets as well as the
administrative effort to align funding where it is needed.
As DHS seeks to sustain the financial viability of Medicaid, it needs an appropriations structure that
enables nimble and efficient administration. Removing barriers to flexibly administer Medicaid and
related health services across DHS would enable organizational collaboration, braided funding, and
maximizing federal to effectively and efficiently operate DHS is a more cost-effective manner.
Under this initiative, the State would combine appropriations for the Divisions of Medical Services,
County Operations, Provider Services and Quality Assurance, Developmental Disabilities, Aging,
Adult and Behavioral Health Services into one appropriation bill. This could create a single
appropriation for an Office of Medicaid and Health Services so that directly related entities would be
under one authority. Under this option, the Legislature would implement an appropriations structure
similar to the DHS Secretary’s Office Appropriation Act, which consolidates multiple appropriations
into one appropriation act for inter-related shared services. This initiative would not change the
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 34
authority of constitutional boards that provide oversight to state facilities, which would remain in
place.
Consolidating appropriations in this manner would allow for the seamless flow of funds to support
efficient and effective alignment of health-related operations and medical services reimbursements
across divisions. It would allow DHS to deploy personnel to effectively deliver services while
maximizing all appropriate funding sources. It also advances a comprehensive request to the
legislature for Medicaid and health services funding that transcends the current silos across
separate divisions. Moreover, it is aligned with Arkansas’ person-centered philosophy of treating
Medicaid beneficiaries and families in a more wholistic manner and working across divisions to
enhance independence and self-sufficiency.
Under this initiative, separate appropriations would remain for the Divisions of Youth Services, and
Children and Family Services, both of which provide services to Medicaid-involved children and
youth but do not directly support Medicaid and health service delivery administration. The office of
the Secretary would also maintain its structure as the umbrella shared service organization.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – DHS Work Plan provides the action steps in the
recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with DHS staff and review
of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Provide early outreach to Legislative leaders and outline in a clear manner the benefits to the
State, its taxpayers, DHS, and its beneficiaries and families served.
• Develop a fiscal impact analysis that shows cost neutrality.
• Develop outreach materials designed to educate legislators about how:
o This type of authority will help DHS more effectively operate health services for
individuals and families.
o It will allow DHS to more wholistically meet its mission.
o It will allow DHS to maximize additional federal funding.
o DHS will more effectively leverage assets from finance and cost allocation purposes that
will aid all divisions in meeting their initiatives, especially with allowing for braided and
blended funding.
o Moving away from funding silos will help DHS meet its growing demand and need for
quality staffing in critical need areas without having to ask for future budget increases or
have an impact in services, and without having to add new positions.
Arkansas is one of a few states that report very large amounts of individual Appropriation Bills during
the budget process. 16 In 22 states, departments receive lump sum appropriations. 17 State agencies
have varying degrees of flexibility to authorize transfers of previously enacted appropriations
16
National Association of State Budget Officers, Budget Process In the States, 2020-2021
NASBO_2021_Budget_Processes_in_the_States_S.pdf.
17
NASBO, Table 23, p. 142.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 35
between departments, programs and classes. Greater restrictions are placed on transfers between
departments than between divisions or programs within the departments. 18
Agencies have transfer authority to move funds between object classes of appropriations in 38 states
and only 7, Arkansas being one, require legislative committee approval. Note, this legislative
committee approval in Arkansas is limited to non-Medicaid appropriations. No state has reported
that such transfers are not allowed without full legislative approval. However, as noted, in Arkansas
this authority is not allowed if the transfer of appropriation involves Medicaid funds.
Transfers of funds between programs within a department or agency is allowed without any approval
authority needed in 19 states. Among states that do not give agencies such authority, 23 of them give
the budget or executive office that authority. 19
Recommended steps for establishing a single Medicaid appropriation for DHS (future state):
• Review and verify financial systems capacity to properly account for and report budget to
actual performance and financial statements to align with a consolidated appropriations act.
• Document business cases on how consolidated appropriations would enable DHS to
effectively align the organization to achieve maximum efficiency.
• Meet with Legislative leaders from both Houses to develop support, outline the DHS
roadmap for implementation, including strategies to address specific legislative concerns.
Discuss business case.
• Work with group of key Legislators and the Office of Legislative and Intergovernmental Affairs
to draft legislation that would consolidate appropriations into a single Office of Medicaid and
Health Services, including co-design of financial reporting and controls.
• Receive Executive approval before moving forward.
• Engage stakeholders in review of proposed appropriation language and share Business Case.
• Ensure that the legislation has the appropriate transparency and organizational controls
• Establish the required financial controls.
• Develop a fiscal impact statement including analysis that demonstrates the cost neutrality
or long-term savings for any such legislation.
• Pass required statutory changes to support single appropriation.
• Pass biennial budget under the new appropriation structure.
These proposed steps assume a time period of approximately three to six months to prepare
documentation and meet with Legislative officials (including Legislative Council) to identify
champions, build support, and file legislation. This time period also assumes upfront engagement of
interested stakeholders such as key Medicaid provider groups across programs/within each of the
DHS Medicaid divisions.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This single appropriation
initiative also supports a financial and organizational alignment of Medicaid with the continuum of
18
NASBO, Table 23, p. 145.
19
NASBO, Table 25, p. 152.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 36
health services provided through DHS and the broad infrastructure that supports Medicaid
sustainability. There is no impact on staffing and no resources are needed for this initiative.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: DHS
would need to perform a fiscal impact analysis to demonstrate cost neutrality and/or a cost benefit
calculation before any such legislation were to pass. Assuming passage, DHS should prepare to
provide on-going and updated feedback to the legislature related to any fund transfers and also
measure impact on an on-going basis.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: This initiative is expected
to result in:
• Improved coordination and planning across Medicaid divisions
• Improved ability to draw down Federal funds and allocate among most impacted divisions
Success could be measured using the ratio of federal funds to overall Medicaid funds (this would be
expected to increase over time).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: This initiative will lead to more efficient and effective management of DHS’s scarce
resources across all divisions and will also serve to help maximize federal funds, through braided or
blended fund transfers in a more impactful manner. It will also help with shifting funds to cover
critical staffing resources. It is anticipated that this initiative will result in cost savings/cost avoidance
but calculation is indeterminable at this time. A complete fiscal analysis will be conducted by DHS
once preliminary approval is received for this initiative. DHS will then implement proper fiscal
controls to monitor any future transfer and activities under this single appropriation Medicaid
system.
Change Management Plan: DHS will need to ensure additional fiscal controls are in place with
any inter-department transfers made between divisions. There will also need to be accounting and
reporting that demonstrates factors impacting the cost allocation for any blended or braided
Medicaid funding opportunities that are created, including personnel and operational changes.
Figure 11 summarizes communication tasks that are also included in Appendix A – DHS Work Plan.
Figure 11 – DHS-4 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Legislative • Single Appropriation will enable • Meetings • Janet Mann
Stakeholders more effective management of with • Misty Eubanks
Medicaid Health Services Legislative
• More flexibility to manage on- leadership
going day to day services for
the Medicaid population and
meet growing demands
• Ability to transfer Medicaid
funds among divisions will
enhance DHS’s ability to
maximize federal funding and
allow for more appropriate
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 37
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
braiding and blending of funds
rather than 100% use of general
funds
Division Leaders • Single Appropriation will enable • Staff • Janet Mann
more effective management of bulletins • Misty Eubanks
Medicaid Health Services • Staff emails
• More flexibility to manage on- • All staff
going day to day services for meetings
the Medicaid population and
meet growing demands
• Ability to transfer Medicaid
funds among divisions will
enhance DHS’s ability to
maximize federal funding and
allow for more appropriate
braiding and blending of funds
rather than 100% use of general
funds Logistical changes will
be communicated on an as-
needed basis
Providers and • more effective management of • Stakeholder • Janet Mann
Stakeholders Medicaid Health Services email lists • Misty Eubanks
• More flexibility to manage on- • Stakeholder
going day to day services for forum
the Medicaid population and
meet growing demands
• Ability to transfer Medicaid
funds among divisions will
enhance DHS’s ability to
maximize federal funding and
allow for more appropriate
braiding and blending of funds
rather than 100% use of general
funds
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 38
Initiative DHS #5 - Increase customer contact points in community settings
This initiative seeks to increase customer contact points in community settings with a high volume
of potential beneficiaries and reduce costs for low-volume office locations, as practical. DHS seeks
to implement this initiative in alignment with the statewide shared services strategy to modernize
and maximize the state’s real estate footprint and leverage technology to provide consumer-centered
solutions to augment in-person contact center offerings.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Arkansas Code 25-10-115 (a) provides that the “Secretary
of the Department of Human Services shall establish a county office of human services in each
county of this state. The county offices shall provide the citizens of each county access to the various
services and programs provided by the Department of Human Services as well as follow-up contact
and services.” Moreover, Section (b) of that same statute provides: “In establishing a county office of
human services, it is necessary that each county office be staffed to provide complete access to
services and programs of the department.”
DHS’ Division of County Operations (DCO) operates 80 county offices and ensures that Arkansans
who need food assistance, health care, and other services can access help through DHS programs
and operations. The DCO county office staff processes applications for several public assistance
programs, including medical services (Medicaid), the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program
(SNAP), and the Transitional Employment Assistance (TEA) program. In addition, DCO oversees the
Emergency Solutions Grant program, which helps local communities address homelessness by
providing resources for building repairs and support funds. The Division also assists newly arrived
eligible refugees assimilate to the American way of life by providing financial and medical services
for those eligible for up to eight months after arrival in the United States.
In addition to these DCO services, other important services and programs offered by other DHS
divisions, such as Youth Services; Children and Family Services; and Aging, Adult and Behavioral
Health Services are also housed and operated out of each of these county offices.
Rationale: Most of these county offices serve only DHS programs and are sometimes located in
environments and locations that are neither the most familiar places to individuals and families who
benefit from DHS programs nor the most desirable, family-friendly environments for children and
others. Because of the statutory requirement to operate a location in each county, DHS continues to
operate offices in areas with less traffic, preventing realization of some cost efficiencies.
Moreover, the pandemic underscored the need for governments to think and act differently in the
face of a changing world. It is now incumbent upon the State to keep pace with those changes and
identify how it can deliver high quality services at maximum value to its constituents.
Thus, DHS is looking to pilot moving some or all of its county operations and services in a given county
to commonly used and known retail spaces, spaces that are family-friendly, used by, or in close
proximity to, well-recognized community partners, and locations that are much more cost-effective,
such as ones that leverage existing government agency partner services, such as community
colleges and workforce development boards, among others. This could include a recommendation
to identify a regional office setting that combines two or more counties, where it is more efficient,
desirable, has minimal impact on access, and embraces the community fabric.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 39
DHS is also looking to use technology to enhance the beneficiary experience in the future. One of the
Arkansas Forward initiatives – DHS-2 – creates a more efficient beneficiary experience through a
Customer Service Center. Greater availability of self-service functionality and technology-enabled
engagement could diversity the delivery of services and mitigate any risk of impact to beneficiary
access to DHS.
Finally, as part of the family friendly environment, DHS is considering options to pilot a county or
regional office in a location that is open outside of normal business hours, so many of its families
receiving services where parents are employed and have difficulty meeting with DHS staff during
normal business hours can have the flexibility to meet after work.
Implementation Considerations: In implementing this initiative, DHS must be mindful of the
current law, but should not consider the current law an impediment to identifying a location(s) that
is less costly and more efficient and beneficial in terms of citizen access and experience. If the
decision is to pilot a county office at a new location within the county, there would be no need to
change the current law, so long as staff at the location “provide complete access to services and
programs of the department.” This can be accomplished through technology, including tools
used by a new Customer Service Center at the new location. If the pilot involves moving county
operations to a more regional location, DHS will have to seek a statutory change. Such a change,
however, should allow for flexibility to use technology and diversify delivery of services.
Other states have demonstrated creativity in service delivery to improve engagement of beneficiaries
and offer options for consideration by DHS.
Virginia
In the State of Virginia, some of the Local Departments of Social Services LDSSs, who administer the
state social services programs in every county, have begun stationing workers in hospitals and
schools, and some others co-locate at food banks a few days a month. Another example of co-
location in the community is that of Richmond/Henrico Department of Health. The health
department staff are state employees in Virginia, but there is a local funding contribution as
well. They have several Resource Centers located in public housing communities that are staffed by
Community Health Workers - https://www.vdh.virginia.gov/richmond-city/resource-centers/. These
County Health District Resource Centers offer a variety of clinical and community health services in
Richmond’s public housing communities and in the Southwood Apartments. All services are
available to anyone, and the cost is based on a sliding scale. There are similar centers in other health
districts. 20
In addition, a partnership between Chesterfield County Public Library (CCPL) and the Chesterfield-
Colonial Heights Department of Social Services (DSS) is bringing valued community resources
closer to home for residents, while also eliminating barriers like cost, travel and technology
requirements 21. Clients come to the library searching for information on a variety of topics, such as
public health, housing, food insecurity and more. Regularly hosting social services at the library
allows citizens to get important information they need in a timely, accessible manner. DSS staff are
20
Source: Virginia Association of Counties
https://www.chesterfield.gov/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=5121&fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR0G4lWZa-
21
1FDbUIl8nYK8OhZKP22xpzk6hs3xzL1w-BPIH3rzvkLQCJNFU_aem_T0DDa2kapRPSN6o72wBbJw
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 40
available to help customers initiate services, determine eligibility for government programs,
complete documents and inquire about the status of their cases. DSS offers a variety of programs
and resources for community members, including information on:
• Adoption services;
• Companion services;
• Employment aid;
• Fuel assistance;
• Medicaid;
• Refuge assistance;
• SNAP benefits; and,
• View a complete list of DSS resources.
Oklahoma
Over the past few years, the State of Oklahoma has embarked on a Human Services Real Estate
Modernization (REM) strategy where they have closed 59 human service offices that were either
leased or owned and saved an excess of $10 million dollars annually. Human Service offices were
moved to new and innovative “Human Service Centers” within retail spaces that were the center of
the community.
Wisconsin
Vision 2023 envisioned a state that offers the public convenient “one-stop” venues for government
services both physically and digitally, and where state workers can deliver those services most
efficiently. This vision was introduced “in response to the public’s raised expectations for
governments to be more agile, accessible, and responsive.”22 The Vision supported the hybrid work
environment that can promote higher productivity, increased applicant interest, and higher retention
among employees. It also made recommendations for state office locations where staff were
afforded “telework opportunities that put family-supporting public service jobs within reach of
Wisconsinites who live outside of the Madison and Milwaukee areas.” It allowed underused state
properties to be acquired and redeveloped by the private sector, fueling new economic and
community development opportunities in Wisconsin communities.
An example was the move in 2022 of the Wisconsin Department of Health Services (DHS) to relocate
its Milwaukee Enrollment Services (MilES) Center to improve safety, security, and access, and be
better able to meet the needs of community members. In that case, the DHS offices were moved to
a building that housed the Department of Labor services that saved the state $15 million dollars. 23
Vision 2030 for Wisconsin took the planning further to reduce the state office footprint to account for
more remote work, with an expected savings of at least $9 million. 24
22
Wisconsin Department of Administration’s Vision 2023, for Wisconsin State Government Facilities and
Workforce Space, Updated March 2023, page 1.
23
Wisconsin Department of Administration’s Vision 2023, 4.
24
Wisconsin Public Radio, March 22, 2024, “State agencies could offload even more office space, remote work
audit finds,” https://www.wpr.org/news/state-agencies-could-offload-even-more-office-space-remote-work-
audit-finds.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 41
Maryland
Maryland Department of General Services recently announced a state plan to relocating state
agencies in from its State Center complex in Baltimore City to downtown Baltimore in order to “play
an active role in revitalizing Baltimore’s central business district.” 25
Federal Government
In one example not focused on the citizen impact, General Services Administration has outlined its
Workplace 2030 strategy related to the approach for the office space it owns and leases in over 2,000
locations nationally. Workplace 2030 encourages federal agencies to collocate as a savings
strategy. 26
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• DHS should develop and promulgate selection criteria and/or rules for community sites to
minimize the perception of arbitrary selection of community partners.
• DHS should establish and monitor operational metrics for the pilot and review each stage of
scaling and run parallel operations during any transition period so as to not disrupt any
services for populations in need.
• DHS should identify the areas where a pilot makes most sense and, identify possible
community partners, meet with the community partners and other stakeholders, assess any
potential impact to access, as well as mitigation of risk and the overall benefits to that
particular region of the state and its surrounding communities. DHS should meet with state
and local lawmakers to provide transparency, obtain buy-in and support, and inform any
future legislative requests/recommendations.
• DHS should meet with TSS to ensure alignment with this initiative and the state’s broader real
estate portfolio strategy.
Recommended steps for establishing more community-based contact points (future state):
• Map current processes, visit/transaction volume, and customer types across DHS services
and counties;
• Define vision for new operating model, including benefits to Arkansans and to DHS
employees;
• Develop screening process/criteria and data to identify potential community sites;
25
Maryland Department of General Services, “Maryland Department of General Services Announces Request
for Proposals to Lease Space for Multiple State Agencies in Baltimore City,” April 30, 2024,
https://news.maryland.gov/dgs/2024/04/30/maryland-department-of-general-services-announces-request-
for-proposals-to-lease-space-for-multiple-state-agencies-in-baltimore-city/.
Federal News Network, “Agencies coming around to sharing office space as future plans come into focus,”
March 23, 2023, https://federalnewsnetwork.com/facilities-construction/2023/03/agencies-coming-around-
to-sharing-office-space-as-future-plans-come-into-focus/.
26
Federal News Network, “Agencies coming around to sharing office space as future plans come into
focus,” March 23, 2023, https://federalnewsnetwork.com/facilities-construction/2023/03/agencies-
coming-around-to-sharing-office-space-as-future-plans-come-into-focus/.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 42
• Meet with TSS to review plans and discuss opportunities to align with the state’s real estate
strategy;
• Identify community settings with highest volume of potential customer touchpoints;
• Establish KPIs and measurement processes;
• Assess any potential impact to access, as well as mitigation of risk and the overall benefits
to that particular region of the state and its surrounding communities;
• Meet with all local and state legislative representatives in the region to ensure buy in and
support;
• Draft new policies and processes for community-based contact centers;
• Identify site(s) for pilot and conduct technology needs assessment based on location
selected;
• Conduct internal trainings with pilot service teams;
• Run pilot program and collect / review data;
• Identify potential statutory changes and syndicate with legislative committees, including
vision for new operating model and outcomes from pilot;
• Pass required statutory changes;
• Expand pilot to additional locations and counties; and,
• Assess potential of moving county operations to a new model.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative aligns with
the spirit of Arkansas Forward and the goals of DHS. One of the goals of Arkansas Forward is to look
to use technology to enhance the experience for beneficiaries and their families. This initiative
considers how to deploy technology to enhance the customer experience without the need to visit
the county offices for beneficiaries and situations in which this would be appropriate. In addition,
another DHS priority initiative is the development of a Contact Service Center (DHS-2) that can utilize
well-informed and trained person-centered call center staff and other technology (such as
interactive voice response and artificial intelligence) to ease the burden of DOC and division staff.
Currently, these staff have to be available continuously to address beneficiary, family, and citizen
issues and concerns. This effort could result in more overall efficiency in DHS operations, which is
aligned with the goals of Arkansas Forward.
DHS may need additional staff resources during the transition period to ensure no disruption in
service. There may be a need for new technology systems for community operations and resources
for leasing space in community settings. The fiscal impact cannot be determined without
considering which offices would be impacted and which settings would be selected as alternate
locations.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: This
initiative changes the location and settings where DCO staff perform job duties, which may result in
the adoption of flexible work schedules for certain DCFS and DJS workers meeting children and
families. DHS may revise personnel policies accordingly.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: This initiative is expected
to increase customer touchpoints; increase customer satisfaction; and decrease operating costs.
Metrics to track the impact of this initiative include:
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 43
• Number of visits completed after hours and percent of after hours appointments (shows
expanded availability to beneficiaries)
• Number of visits/transactions per location
• Number of customer touchpoints per employee
• Customer satisfaction measures (e.g., Net Promoter Score)
• Average cost per square foot of leased or owned office locations
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: DHS believes that this initiative could result in a savings over a 2-year period of
$400,000. This estimate is based on reducing costs associated with existing leases for more cost-
effective lease options and potential opportunities for consolidation of offices.
Change Management Plan: Development of options for more convenient and family-friendly
community-based locations, including with greater flexibility and adoption of innovative technology
will improve DHS’s ability to serve and resolve beneficiary and issues and concerns. Communicating
changes in locations clearly to the public and relevant stakeholders will be important in managing
this change. Appendix A – DHS Work Plan includes these tasks, which are summarized in Figure 12.
Figure – DHS-12 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
DHS staff (Including • We are piloting and co- • Staff emails Mary Franklin
DOC Division) locating staff with well- • Town hall Team: Office of
known community partners meetings Legislative &
in places most familiar to • Division Intergovernmental
folks in the county meetings Affairs
• This is opportunity to think
about better hours for our
clients, especially those that
have to work during the day
and adoption of a more
family-friendly approach
• This approach will also help
to create a safe zone for our
DCFS meetings/visitation
• This initiative will create an
opportunity for underused
county locations and
properties to be acquired and
redeveloped by the private
sector, fueling new economic
and community development
opportunities in Arkansas
communities
• Local and • We are piloting and co- • Website Mary Franklin
Legislative Officials locating staff with well- update Team: Office of
• Community known community partners • Release of Legislative &
Partner(s) in places most familiar to Assessment Intergovernmental
folks in the county one pager Affairs
with benefits
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 44
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• We could fill a need in the and cost
community where areas need efficiency
broadband • Road show/
• This is opportunity to think • Community-
about better hours for our based
clients, especially those that presentations
have to work during the day • Press release
and adoption of a more • Local radio
family-friendly approach • Local
• This approach will also help Chambers of
to create a safe zone for our Commerce
DCFS meetings/visitation • Community
• This initiative will create an Partners
opportunity for underused
county locations and
properties to be acquired and
redeveloped by the private
sector, fueling new economic
and community development
opportunities in Arkansas
communities
• We will monitor constituent
impact and be transparent
about changes
• Current statute does not
require all DHS operations to
be in one county building
• This approach will be cost-
effective/cost-saving for the
state, which enables
reinvestment into
programming
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 45
Initiative DHS #6 - Maximize additional federal funding opportunities
This initiative seeks to identify additional funding opportunities not currently maximized in DHS and
develop plans to access funding to increase critical DHS program and service capacity and free up
existing General Revenue funding for other state and departmental priorities. DHS further refined the
focus to be on funding sources serving children, youth, and families served by DCFS and DYS.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DHS has long sought to identify applicable federal
funding and to braid and blend funding sources to best meet the needs of its beneficiaries. However,
DHS recognizes that there are additional federal funding opportunities connected to services for
children and youth in DCFS and DYS that can be pursued, particularly as a result of new federal
policymaking and opportunities now available. These funds can be used to enhance current
prevention activities, while freeing general revenue for use elsewhere in the budget.
One opportunity relates to the 2018 passage of the Family First Prevention Services Act (FFPSA). This
Act represents the most significant shift in federal funding for child welfare services in recent history.
The act increases the focus of child welfare systems towards keeping children safely with family so
as to avoid the trauma resulting from placement in out-of-home care. To meet this goal, the law
provides families with greater access to mental health services, substance use treatment, and/or
parenting skills courses and gives states the ability to access title IV-E federal funds to pay for these
services. This significantly shifts how child welfare systems will coordinate and provide services to
families and youth. As a result, it changes the role of community service providers, the way courts
advocate and make decisions for families, and the types of placements available to youth placed in
out-of-home care.
As one of the early adopters of FFPSA, Arkansas DHS has made significant strides as it relates to
prevention services but, like many states, has struggled with many of the challenges related to
implementation of FFPSA. DCFS recognizes the challenges that come with implementing a large-
scale change to a longstanding service delivery system. While FFPSA allows Title IV-E funds to be
used towards the provision of preventative services to families and children, prior to entry into foster
care, the law requires significant planning, collaboration, and partnership between child welfare,
Medicaid, and other existing divisions using federal funding to pay for the provision of these services.
In particular, the Act is clear in that Title IV-E is the payor of last resort for those families that are
Medicaid eligible.
To date, however, Arkansas DCFS has not fully expended, maximized, or leveraged federally available
funds under Title IV-E to the degree other jurisdictions are able to achieve. This can include
administrative training costs and service delivery. As a result, a disproportionate level of state funding
has been required to operate the system. Data comparing some of the claiming of other states under
the FFPSA shows that there are significant opportunities to increase federal Title IV-E revenue, while
at the same time enhancing prevention service opportunities for many at risk children and families,
a priority of DHS.
An additional opportunity relates to the fact that Arkansas is not drawing down federal Title IV-E funds
for administrative costs that are tied directly to traditional candidates of foster care while other states
are. This is an immediate opportunity to receive additional federal funding through cost allocation
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 46
and by looking outside of DCFS in a more global manner where many administrative shared service
costs can be allocated to DCFS activity in case managing foster care children.
There are also opportunities to maximize Medicaid funding. In FY24 Arkansas, DCFS spent $8.7
million (including $2.1 million in general funds that are not matched) on its Intensive In Home Service
(IIHS) program, while the Division of Youth Services (DYS) currently spent over $14 million dollars for
its Community Services and uses over $3 million dollars of TANF to fund and operate its own
Intensive In-Home Service (IIHS). DYS anticipates spending another $1 million of TANF funds on this
program in FY 2025. The IIHS program has had significant positive outcomes, and these services are
also reducing higher costs for residential care. Currently, DHS is not using any Medicaid funding for
IIHS, even where some of the case management activities would qualify for allowable Medicaid
costs. This would require a change in the Arkansas Medicaid State Plan, which would have to be
approved by CMS. This could also free up these TANF dollars to be spent in other important
prevention areas.
Finally, Arkansas is also using Federal Title IV-B prevention dollars for administrative costs rather than
actual prevention services. Through this initiative and effort to maximize federal funds, Arkansas can
free up some of these IV-B dollars by supplanting with repurposed general revenue, TANF or
Medicaid, where appropriate, and IV-B funding can be used to fund additional prevention programs
that could serve to reduce the risk of future involvement with the DCFS or DYS program and avoid
significant longer-term costs.
Rationale: After meeting with DHS and DCFS leadership, DHS cost allocation contract staff, and
reviewing statewide payment and federal claims data, multiple opportunities were identified to
enhance federal reimbursement for:
• Title IV-E eligible administrative expenditures for title IV-E Candidates;
• FFPSA title IV-E eligible costs, including additional services, administrative, and training;
• Future Community Pathways under FFPSA; and,
• Braiding and blending traditional Medicaid matching funds for FFPSA evidence-based
programs and for DCFS and DYS IIHS.
Claiming for Administrative Costs
DCFS has not claimed federal reimbursement for all eligible title IV-E administrative costs. This
includes expenditures related to both traditional title IV-E candidacy and administrative costs for
eligible expenses incurred by contracted child placing agencies. Federal reimbursement for these
costs may be claimed for the current quarter and retroactively for the seven (7) previous quarters.
Federal financial participation (at a rate of 50%) may be claimed for administrative cost expenditures
necessary for the proper and efficient administration of the Title IV–E plan as identified at 45 CFR
1356.60(c). Reimbursement is available regardless of whether the child is actually placed in out-of-
home foster care and becomes eligible for title IV-E foster care benefits. Such costs include:
The following are examples of allowable administrative costs necessary for the administration of the
foster care program:
• Referral to services;
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 47
• Preparation for and participation in judicial determinations;
• Placement of the child;
• Development of the case plan;
• Case reviews;
• Case management and supervision;
• Recruitment and licensing of foster homes and institutions;
• Rate setting;
• A proportionate share of related agency overhead; and,
• Costs related to data collection and reporting.
Reimbursement is limited to those individuals reasonably viewed as candidates for title IV-E foster
care maintenance payments consistent with section 472(i)(2) of the Social Security Act.
A candidate for foster care is federally defined as a child who is at serious risk of removal from home
as evidenced by the Title IV-E agency either pursuing his/her removal from the home or making
reasonable efforts to prevent such removal. It is important to note, a child may not be considered a
candidate for foster care solely because the Title IV-E agency is involved with the child and his/her
family. In order for the child to be considered a candidate for foster care, the Title IV-E agency's
involvement with the child and family must be for the specific purpose of either removing the child
from the home or satisfying the reasonable efforts requirement with regard to preventing removal.
A review of documentation provided by Arkansas DCFS indicates the state has not claimed federal
reimbursement for expenditures related to children and youth considered to be foster care
candidates. DCFS does have the ability to claim expenditures for the current quarter and
retroactively for the seven (7) previous quarters. Thus, DHS should consider seeking retroactive
claims for eligible past periods.
Finally, in claiming administrative costs, DCFS must think broadly, across DHS. Many of the
claimable Title IV-E administrative costs in Arkansas are not only conducted by DCFS finance or
administrative staff. DCFS can also look to administrative costs across DHS shared services and
Medicaid and should ensure that it has done so before submitting any past or future administrative
claims to the federal government.
Going forward, continued reimbursement for more global DHS administrative costs relevant to the
administration of programs and services for Title IV-E candidates of foster care should be standard
practice.
FFPSA Title IV-E eligible costs, including additional services, administrative, and training
Though Arkansas was one of the early adopters of FFPSA implementation in the nation, Arkansas has
reported comparatively low expenditures and federal reimbursement for services. During FY 2022,
Arkansas reported serving an average of 405 children per quarter and received federal Title IV-E
reimbursement of $1.8 million, for average federal reimbursement for children served per quarter of
$4,500. 27 According to ACF during the same time period, Washington D.C. served 465 children at an
27
Administration for Children and Families, “Title IV-E Prevention Program,”
https://www.acf.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/documents/cb/fy-2022-title-iv-e-prevention-services.xlsx).
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 48
average federal reimbursement for children served per quarter of $15,951. Illinois reported serving
1,290 children at an average reimbursement per quarter of $20,355 per child. Iowa served less than
Arkansas during the same time period at 373 but reported an average reimbursement of $13,885 per
child per quarter. Arkansas can look to these other state claiming practices and identify additional
Title IV-E funds to support its current evidence-based programming under FFPSA.
Additionally, Arkansas can look to add additional evidence-based programs to its Title IV-E
Prevention plan and claim for these services. For example, Motivational Interviewing (MI) is an
approved, well-supported evidence-based program under the FFPSA Federal Clearinghouse and has
been shown to be an effective intervention when used by itself or together with a combination of
other treatments to reduce risk of maltreatment and placement into out of home care. MI can be
used to promote behavior change with a range of target populations and for a variety of problem
areas. To be able to claim MI, DCFS would need to meet additional continuous quality improvement
(CQI) activities related to MI. Federal guidance refers to the CQI requirements, including how
implementation of services and programs will be continuously monitored, to ensure fidelity to the
practice, determine outcomes achieved, and apply information learned from monitoring to refine
and improve practice. Costs associated with delivering a MI service can be claimed to prevention
services or prevention administration.
Moreover, case management is an allowable Title IV-E administration cost. When integrated with
case management, MI is both a prevention service and an allowable administration cost, so DCFS
may decide whether to claim MI costs under the rules governing claiming for prevention services or
under the rules governing administration. When MI is incorporated into case management, it can be
added to every prevention candidate’s prevention plan as part of the strategy to prevent placement
into foster care, even when the family needs no other approved Family First service. DCFS can begin
claiming for these prevention services in addition to prevention services administration costs when
a child’s prevention plan begins, provided all other eligibility requirements are met. Thus, DCFS
should consider training all front-line staff in MI and claim these expenses.
Finally, there are additional opportunities to maximize claiming for FFPSA training costs in DHS’ Cost
Allocation Plan. Training costs can also be claimed if the training is related to prevention and only for
prevention staff, rather than for a larger group of workers such as prevention, foster care, and
adoption services workers, at 50% federal financial participation. 28 Training costs can also be
claimed at 75% when it relates to foster care training. It appears that Arkansas is maximizing funds
appropriately for foster care training but for prevention services training, there still could be
additional opportunities.
Prevention training costs include items such as: determining individuals who are eligible for the
services or programs, how to identify and provide appropriate services and programs, and how to
oversee and evaluate the ongoing appropriateness of the services and programs. Thus, DCFS should
consider adding an FFPSA training activity code to its Random Moment Time Study (RMTS) survey to
capture time that staff are in FFPSA related training, which should also increase Title IV-E funding.
28
ACF Children’s Bureau, “Program Instructions - Approval of a revised form for reporting financial data on the
title IV-E Foster Care, Adoption Assistance, Guardianship Assistance, Kinship Navigator and Prevention
Services Programs,” ACYF-PI-CB-18-12 pi1812.pdf (hhs.gov).
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 49
Future Community Pathways under FFPSA
Recently, some states have received federal approval to broaden their FFPSA-eligible candidates for
federal reimbursement by adopting community pathways that can provide Title IV-E funding for
children and families that do not have an open DCFS case and have not yet even been reported for
abuse and neglect. These children are at risk of entry into foster care but entered the system through
a community-based prevention partner program, such as Healthy Families America. This allows for
additional federal reimbursement and meets the Arkansas DHS priority of moving its programming
upstream to reach families before they are involved with DCFS or other DHS services. Currently,
DHS/DCFS has not expanded upon its Title IV-E Prevention Plan to include a Community Pathway.
Developing a Community Pathway for prevention services in the state’s Title IV-E Prevention Plan can
help expand access and provide preventive services to these children and families while also
reducing the future burden on the DCFS system and also generating substantial future cost
avoidance.
Braiding and blending traditional Medicaid matching funds for FFPSA evidence-based programs and
for other DCFS and DYS IIHS
Arkansas DHS is not currently taking advantage of braided and blended funding opportunities that
could serve to maximize the use of federal Medicaid and Title IV-E funds even further. For this
initiative, there would need to be coordination with Medicaid. In fact, FFPSA was passed with the
intention of leveraging existing Medicaid payments for mental health, substance abuse, and in-home
parenting services when the family is Medicaid eligible. The Act is clear in that jurisdictions are to
consider Title IV-E the “payor of last resort” when coordinating the provision of these interventions,
as it was always contemplated where Medicaid is an allowable cost for these prevention services,
states should use Medicaid before drawing down Title IV-E.
Thus, Arkansas DCFS could look to braid funding for some of its evidence-based programs that have
therapeutic components of the service, so long as they are allowable costs under the Medicaid State
Plan. DHS can then take advantage of a larger federal matching rate for the blended services, since
the current federal medical assistance percentage (FMAP) of 72% federal funding is higher than the
50% Title IV-E match available under FFPSA.
Currently, therapeutic components of the FFPSA evidence-based programs are not being billed to
Medicaid and other funding is being accessed to support the provisions of these programs, meaning
that Arkansas is not taking full advantage of this higher match rate. Also, components of the IIHS
program in both DCFS and DYS have Medicaid-allowable services that could be included in the
Medicaid State Plan. This could also add considerably to the federal match. For example, the
Intercept program, which is also an intensive, in-home evidence-based program that DFCS utilizes
in several counties, is being funded through blending of general revenue and Title IV-E federal funds,
not Medicaid. This program’s case management components that are Medicaid-allowable have been
approved by CMS in other state Medicaid Plans. The same is true for Family Certified Treatment,
which CMS has approved for Medicaid reimbursement in North Carolina. By including the Medicaid-
allowable services in the Arkansas Medicaid State Plan, this could have the advantage of maximizing
additional federal funding opportunities and freeing-up the use of TANF funds to be deployed in other
critical areas and allow for additional funds to cover services in DYS, such as expansion of CSTP
and/or IIHS.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 50
In maximizing opportunities to draw down additional federal funding, either through Title IV-E or
Medicaid, Arkansas DHS can free-up general revenue as well as federal funding streams such as
TANF to be used in other areas that are needed and part of DHS’s prevention priority. This could also
serve as direct savings and cost avoidance by reducing the risk of more costly future services and
programming for many of these at-risk children, youth, and families.
Some examples of how this reallocation could occur through freed-up revenue include:
• If Medicaid funds paid for a portion of the IIHS program for Medicaid eligible children, youth
and families, both DCFS and DYS could reallocate current general revenue and TANF revenue
that is used for other prevention programs, which could also include an expansion of the
existing footprint.
• DYS has funded the Civilian Student Training Program (CSTP) since it was created in 1993 for
the purpose of providing training, education, health, welfare, rehabilitative and other
services to juveniles. CSTP is open to juvenile court-ordered male participants ages 13 to 17
years old. It is an eight to nine-week residential program that teaches behavior management,
criminal behavior deterrence, citizenship, physical fitness, academic and life skills, and
community service. CSTP provides a structured, disciplined environment that promotes
effective self-discipline, respect for authority, and good citizenship. When students leave the
program, they participate in a one-year re-entry/mentorship program that helps them remain
productive and successful members of their communities. CSTP staff is made up of
professional staff, including trainers, nurses and teachers. Because CSTP is considered a
diversion program from the juvenile court system, other court staff such as intake or
probation officers could also make a referral of a youth on behalf of a family. DHS reports the
cost of CSTP program to be $15,000 per student, compared to the cost of DYS juvenile
placement of $49,500 per student, resulting in a savings of $34,500 per CSTP student. The
percentage of CSTP students that avoid DYS placement for a period of three years has been
remarkably high, at 80%. Thus, DHS is looking to expand the CSTP program to add 32
additional beds, including at least 8 beds for females, broadening the opportunity for
participation. The cost for such expansion is $2.3 million dollars, including salaries for staff
and capital expenditures, and much of this could be covered by enhancing claiming for Title
IV-E and for drawing down additional Medicaid match.
• DHS is using most of its Title IV-B federal prevention funding for administrate costs rather
than prevention programing. The claiming of these additional Title IV-E and Medicaid funds
can also have the effect of allowing DHS to use IV-B for upstream prevention services in
collaboration with communities.
Implementation Considerations: To claim for these additional federal funds, DHS will need to
update its current Cost Allocation Plan and Medicaid State Plan, among potentially other
documents. Updating these plans with new codes takes time and resources and DHS will need to be
committed to this process and may need additional resources. Today DHS, uses contractors to
develop and manage aspects of the Cost Allocation Plan. It may be more cost effective to have DHS
develop the internal capacity to manage this process.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 51
In addition, other states have had difficulty with braiding and blending Medicaid dollars with FFPSA
evidence-based programming because of the complexities involved in establishing the portion of
Medicaid allowable costs per program, and providers have had difficulty with Medicaid requirements
so these funds can be claimed. This will involve an initial administrative burden for DHS and
providers, but in the long run should generate a significant return on investment for DHS.
Finally, for any Medicaid State Plan change that would cover the delivery of any one of the FFPSA or
IIHS evidence-based prevention programs, DHS should also be mindful in implementing the change
that it does not require too high standards of provider certification – such as requiring master degree
supervision where bachelor degree supervision is allowed – that it will have an impact on capacity
and access in many of the rural areas of Arkansas that have a hard time finding providers. This can
be done without compromising program outcomes.
Other state best practices also provide some guidance for DHS in implementing this initiative:
FFPSA Expansion
Indiana
Indiana broadened its eligibility definition to include families serviced by Healthy Families
Indiana/America, even if outside of the Department of Child Services, as eligible for FFPSA
prevention services.
Indiana also adopted the Indiana Family Preserving Services (INFPS), shifting from fee-for-service to
per-diem-based reimbursement and performance-based contracting with providers. Indiana
included referrals that could be made to any California Clearinghouse evidence-based program.
Indiana’s intervention is being evaluated by the Federal ACYF contractor now, and if approved even
as a supported evidence-based program, this will open avenues for Indiana and other states to
enhance claiming. 29
Nebraska
Nebraska successfully included children without a service case (e.g., reunified with caregiver
following a placement) as eligible for FFPSA prevention services. 30
Washington D.C.
Washington D.C used FFPSA as an opportunity to embed motivational interviewing (MI) as a core
approach to supporting families across agencies and community providers.
Development of Community Pathway
New York
New York collaborates with Healthy Families New York (HFNY) and local departments of social
services, making any child referred to the HFNY program or identified by any local social service
29
Indiana Department of Child Services, “Title IV-E Prevention Plan,” September 29, 2021, Indiana-Prevention-
Plan.pdf.
30
Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services, “Nebraska’s Five-Year Title IV-E Prevention Program
Plan 2020,” 2020, NE FFPSA 5 Year Plan.pdf.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 52
department considered a “candidate for foster care” thus expanding the reach of FFPSA Title IV-E
funding to upstream at-risk families. The state has indicated that it intends to expand the criteria even
further to include children identified by other state agencies as well. 31
Washington D.C.
In Washington D.C., the Child and Family Services Agency has received approval in its FFPSA plan to
use Title IV-E for families that come to the attention of child welfare system and are referred to one
of five community collaboratives. The Collaboratives connect families to a range of community
services. They also provide case management using motivational interviewing to connect families to
specific services based on their needs. 32
Additional Resources
Casey Family Programs has made additional resources available on how states are building
community pathways through their FFPSA planning. 33
Other Innovations under FFPSA that Will Enhance Claiming
Kentucky
In Kentucky, the Department of Community Based Services (DCBS) updated its business process
across the agency to allow for the claiming of enhanced prevention services under FFPSA. DCBS has:
• Trained services providers to report child/family specific costs related to provision of Title IV-
E evidence-based practices.
• Made changes in IT to create an invoicing portal for service providers.
• Made improvements to its cost allocation methodology to allow for costs to be claimed to
Title IV-E, where appropriate.
• Updated quarterly claim process to capture as many Title IV-E allowable costs on the
quarterly CB-496.
Massachusetts
In Massachusetts, the state focused on enhancing Title IV-E claiming to maximize federal funding
opportunities from 2016-2019. The Department of Children and Families located legal documents
that were required to demonstrate Title IV-E eligibility for children under the supervision of the state.
This effort produced over $36 million in new federal reimbursement because of locating legal
documents necessary for completing Title IV E determinations.
Washington D.C.
31
New York State Office of Children and Family Services, “New York State Family First Prevention Services Act
Prevention Plan,” February 23, 2022, https://ocfs.ny.gov/main/sppd/docs/FFPSA-Prevention-Plan-
2022Feb23.pdf.
32
DC Child and Family Services Agency, “Putting Families First in DC<” DC CFSA Family First Prevention Plan
Updated Dec 2023_Amendment 2.pdf.
33
Casey Family Programs, “Family First Community Pathways,” August 2022, August 2022_CFP Family First
community pathways.pdf.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 53
Washington D.C. used FFPSA as an opportunity to embed motivational interviewing (MI) as a core
approach to supporting families across agencies and community providers. This has been a key
component of their federal Title IV-E claiming approach. 34
Braided and Blended Funding
Florida
The Florida Department of Children and Families created a Blended and Braided funding workgroup
to focus on identifying strategies to blend and braid Medicaid funding with their nine evidence-based
programs contained within the state’s FFPSA Prevention Plan. An example of an approach taken by
Florida for Multi Systemic Therapy is provided in Figure 13. 35 Note that this workgroup is still meeting
and there is no such plan approved and in place yet in Florida.
34
DC Child and Family Services Agency, “Putting Families First in DC<” DC CFSA Family First Prevention Plan
Updated Dec 2023_Amendment 2.pdf.
35
Example provided by Co-Chair of the Florida DCF Blended and Braided Workgroup – existing work product.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 54
Figure 13 – Florida Blended and Braided Funding Approach Example – Multi-Systemic Therapy
Source: Andry Sweet, CEO of Florida Children’s Home Society, 2024.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 55
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
There is a risk that DCFS is currently underclaiming activities outside of DCFS that involve
administrative duties related to Medicaid and shared services - finance, training, legal, human
resources. In order to enable the success of this initiative, DCFS will need to work alongside its
Division of Shared Services before making changes to its Cost Allocation Plan. This will assure that
all related and indirect expenses are accounted for.
Moreover, this enhanced claiming activity will involve additional resource demands on DHS to ensure
the integrity and accountability of the process. DHS will need to be careful to assure adequate
reporting and documentation to support any potential federal audit. Thus, having proper controls in
place to ensure claiming for any evidence-based services is critical.
Additionally, in the future, with any expansion of FFPSA evidence-based programs, there will be an
issue of capacity of providers to meet the DCFS prevention focus and needs of the family. With the
additional blending and braiding of Medicaid and building provider capacity for evidence-based
services, rates must be structured to support the practice, so that more providers can implement
them with fidelity and achieve the model’s proven results. DHS must be mindful of this issue going
forward to ensure future success.
Finally, for any additional Medicaid claiming, providers will need to be properly trained and
credentialed for billing and it will be incumbent on DHS Medicaid to work with providers to ensure
that the billing process is not so complex that providers are unwilling to participate. Stakeholders will
need to be involved early in the process.
Recommended steps for maximizing federal funding (future state):
In developing the steps needed to establish the future state and implement more aggressive
strategies to improve Title IV-E and Medicaid claiming, DCFS and DYS will need to collaborate with
other DHS divisions, including Medicaid and Shared Services, in creating and implementing the plan,
to recognize the full benefit of this initiative. Steps include:
• DCFS and DYS to identify a federal maximization workgroup co-led by DCFS and DYS and to
include members of other DHS divisions, including Medicaid Finance and Shared Services,
and appropriate contractor staff.
• Develop a detailed workplan to maximize federal funding of Title IV-E (traditional foster care
candidates/FFPSA candidates) and Medicaid and involve all impacted divisions of DHS
outside of DCFS and DYS.
• As part of the workplan, identify:
o Fiscal mapping and identification of specific programs and administrative areas
where federal claiming can be enhanced.
o The type of federal funds and claiming opportunity.
o Where general revenue, TANF and IV-B funding can be freed up and used to enhance
prevention focus.
o Any additional evidence-based practice requirements, including staffing, service
delivery, training and supervision and fidelity monitoring responsibilities to support
model fidelity.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 56
o Any additional funding requirements including client eligibility, provider eligibility, and
service reimbursement coverage and limitations, and identification of opportunities
to blend and braid funding sources.
o For Medicaid State Plan changes, consider workforce demands and possibly relaxing
education requirements for service professionals to maximize workforce capacity
and service accessibility.
• Establish cadence for continual demand measurement and projection to ensure funding
plans are aligned with beneficiary needs.
• Implement needed financial oversight and controls for new funding sources, including
braided/blended streams.
• Revise Cost Allocation Plan.
• Amend State Medicaid plan.
• Develop communication plan for community providers and stakeholders.
• Review and revise training plan.
• Amend State Title IV-E Prevention Plan to include additional evidence-based programming
• Develop the necessary procedures to claim title IV-E federal reimbursement for all eligible
services and activities.
o Administrative costs related to traditional title IV-E candidacy,
o Administrative and training costs related to FFPSA implementation and operation,
o Administrative and training costs incurred by subcontract providers.
• Consider the development of a Community Prevention Pathway to expand services to
families identified as having children at risk of entry to foster care before they become
known to the child welfare system. This will also require an amendment of the current Title
IV-E FFPSA Plan to include this pathway.
• Engage local providers to operate the pathways to leverage additional allowable Title IV-E
funding.
• Consider training all front-line staff in Motivational Interviewing (MI) and claiming these
expenses.
• Measure demand and other KPIs to assess performance of new funding streams.
Finally, DHS should look to invest in developing provider capacity to provide evidence-based
practices statewide. As it is difficult for providers to recoup the cost of recruiting, training, and
credentialing staff to provide evidence-based services with fidelity to the individual model, DHS must
seek to work with contracted providers to develop the staff capabilities required to provide
prevention services to families, especially in remote, rural areas.
Together, these recommendations will not only serve to increase program capacity but serve to
support sustainability through the improved ability to recruit and retain highly qualified staff capable
of implementing evidence-based prevention programs with fidelity.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources:
This initiative seeks to enhance opportunities for additional federal funding that DHS is not currently
taking advantage of. A preliminary estimate indicates this opportunity could fall between $2.5-5
million in additional federal financial participation, based on the federal financial participation drawn
down by states with a comparable number of children served. As already identified, this initiative will
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 57
involve DCFS and DYS staff working across other DHS divisions to enhance claiming opportunities
which will result in a significant return on investment, meet the goals of Arkansas Forward, and is
aligned with a key DHS priority to enhance upstream prevention programming for families that are at
risk of DCFS and DYS services. Implementation of this initiative, however, is complex and will require
changes to the DHS Cost Allocation Plan and Medicaid State Plan, as well as new training, outreach
to stakeholders and changes that providers will need to make to some of their service delivery
components. DHS will need additional resources to take full advantage of this initiative, either
internally or through outside contractors.
DHS may also need to develop new capabilities for financial oversight and control of the new funding
streams. However, all these activities will clearly be to the benefit of DHS and will further allow for
the enhancement of current programing within DHS that has been able to produce significant
positive outcomes.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plan:
Implementation of this initiative includes expanding activities for which certain funding sources are
sought, shifting costs between funding streams to achieve more favorable matching rates, and any
number of other related changes. This is expected to result in changes to the following deliverables
(including but not limited to):
• DHS Cost Allocation Plan
• DHS Medicaid State Plan
DHS may need to ensure the development of additional controls and resources in the course of
implementing this initiative, such as:
• Development of additional financial controls
• Outreach and communication to providers and stakeholders
• New Training for DCFS and DYS staff
• Provider billing and certification changes
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The intent of this initiative
is to increase federal funding available to DHS. Specific measures to demonstrate the success with
this effort include:
• The percentage of additional funding for affected program areas
• The ratio of state to federal funds for affected program areas
• Claiming of federal funds for FFPSA prevention services as compared to baseline (expected
to increase)
• Medicaid funding for prevention programming (expected to increase)
• Total increase in federal reimbursement (comparing fiscal years)
• Number of children, youth and families served in prevention programs (if total funding
increases, this is expected to increase; if total funding is maintained with the proportion of
state/federal funding changing, this will not be impacted)
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: DHS has identified at least $3 million dollars in annual general revenue savings that
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 58
can be captured within 12 months of implementing this Arkansas Forward initiative. These savings
are in addition to the ability to draw down other funds to enable DHS to transfer existing general
revenue and TANF dollars identified earlier on in this initiative. Moreover, by freeing-up general
revenue and TANF funds to be used to enhance DHS’s prevention focus, there will be significant
future cost avoidance based on this Arkansas Forward initiative that is undetermined at this point
and, as, suggested above, it should be part of DHS’s implementation strategy to identify these
savings and report back to the legislature the significant positive impact this initiative can have on
reducing future DHS spending.
Change Management Plan: It is recommended that a team, co-led by DCFS and DYS, form to
oversee this initiative and that this team either include or work closely with current Cost Allocation
Plan and Medicaid finance contract staff to implement this initiative. It will be helpful for this group
to ensure internal staff understand the approach, and the technical direction on how to implement
this initiative. Part of the reason DHS may not be capitalizing on these funding sources today may be
because federal policy continues to change and current staff or contractors may require some
training and support to understand new opportunities. Transparent communication with DHS’
federal agencies will also be needed to ensure the success of the initiative and allow DHS to capture
the anticipated financial benefit. Key communication tasks are included below in Figure 14 and in
Appendix A – DHS Work Plan.
Figure 14 – DHS – 6 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Federal entities (CMS, DHS will need to communicate its • Cost • Sponsors Janet
ACYF) intended plans to federal partners Allocation Mann and Misty
(i.e., CMS and ACYF) through Plan Eubanks
multiple plans and submitted • Title IV-E • Co-Leads DCFS and
documents to achieve approval, Prevention DYS Directors
where required. Plan • Workgroup
• Medicaid Representation from
State Plan other impacted DHS
divisions to form
cross-department
Teams
DHS, Shared Services, • Enhancement of federal • Emails to • Sponsors Janet
DYS and DCFS funding in Title IV-E and staff Mann and Misty
Cost Allocation Plan Medicaid can help free up • Division Eubanks
Contractor Staff funding to be reallocated to meetings • Co-Leads DCFS and
Medicaid Finance expand upstream prevention DYS Directors
Contractor Staff programming • Workgroup
• Enhanced FFPSA and Medicaid Representation from
claiming for evidence-based other impacted DHS
prevention programs, including divisions to form
Intensive In-Home Services will cross-department
reduce the risk of future DCFS Teams
or DYS involvement
• Will need to b
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 59
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Providers • Enhancement of federal • Website for • Sponsors Janet
External Stakeholders funding in Title IV-E and comments Mann and Misty
Medicaid can help free up to Plan Eubanks
funding to be reallocated to changes • Co-Leads DCFS and
expand upstream prevention • Official DYS Directors
programming Notice to • Workgroup
• Enhanced FFPSA and Medicaid Providers for Representation from
claiming for evidence-based comment other impacted DHS
prevention programs, including divisions to form
Intensive In-Home Services will cross-department
reduce the risk of future DCFS Teams
or DYS involvement
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 60
Initiative DHS #7 - Strengthening Payment Integrity and FWA Function
This initiative seeks to develop, implement, and strengthen Payment Integrity (PI) and Fraud Waste
and Abuse (FWA) functions by updating PI policies and improving inter-agency FWA investigation
collaboration to ensure appropriate care, billing, and use of DHS program funds.
Initiative Overview and Current-: DHS’s Payment Integrity and FWA activities help to safeguard
that:
• Eligibility determinations are correct;
• Providers meet and comply with federal and state policies and procedures;
• Services rendered are necessary and appropriate; and,
• Payments are accurate and conform with applicable policies and procedures.
PI and FWA activities and functions are shared with the Department of the Inspector General Office
of Medicaid Integrity General (OMIG) and the Attorney General’s office. Through work sessions and
interviews with DHS’s division staff and leadership, DHS discussed and mapped some key processes
and activities. Although most of the activities retained by DHS pertain to identifying and investigating
beneficiary overpayment and fraud, DHS still operates a payment integrity program, that uses data
analytics to identify occurrences where providers are using loopholes to be paid more than Medicaid
requires. Provider cases are referred to OMIG for investigation and action. Many of the beneficiary
activities are Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)-related.
Some of the key current state activities and issues noted are:
• The department has a dedicated Payment Integrity and Quality Assurance division, however,
some activities are performed by other divisions and as previously noted other departments.
There is collaboration with OMIG and meetings between the departments occur quarterly.
• There is a Special Investigation Unit (SIU) within the Division of County Operations (DCO).
This unit conducts investigations and complies information and evidence into a packet. A
work session identified the SIU workflow and is presented in Figure 15. The DCO has 20 FTEs,
but the unit is also responsible for quality assurance and beneficiary investigation.
• Figure 16 notes that Electronic Verification Vendors are desk audited and DHS works with
OMIG on critical exceptions of these home health claims.
• Visit verification validation and MMIS edits assist in preventing FWA.
• Eligibility specialist document verification, and appropriate Quality Assurance and Quality
Control identify issues and improve prevention. QC workers are reviewing thousands of
cases a year.
• Self-employment cases and individuals using alternative banking like Venmo and PayPal are
difficult to verify.
• There is focus on preventing errors and cost avoidance.
• DHS does conduct PARIS matches, date of death matches, and match with state-operated
correctional facilities. There is no county jail data matching conducted.
• Income and asset data matches using data from commercial entities, such as Equifax have
been previously evaluated but were determined to be not cost effective.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 61
• DHS refers egregious potential Medicaid beneficiary eligibility fraud cases to county
prosecutors.
• There are three investigators and there is a backlog of 15 to 18 months. DHS is in the process
of hiring two additional investigators. Arkansas has one investigator for every 129,000 SNAP
beneficiaries, notably below the average of one investigator for approximately 24,000 SNAP
beneficiaries in states of Missouri, Louisiana, Iowa and Utah (examples provided by DHS).
• The 2023 SNAP overpayment error rate is approximately 10.03%, according to the USDA
(snap-fy23-qc-payment-error-rate.pdf (azureedge.us)), however, Arkansas DHS is capturing
$1.6 million a year or 4% of what has been identified as SNAP overpayment and/or fraud.
• A recent pilot project started where about 6 FTEs from the SIO work alongside PI investigators
from the initial determination to the conclusion of the case, rather than the current hand off
process. The handoff process where SIO completes its work and then hands off to PI
suspected cases of fraud or overpayment is unique to Arkansas. This pilot has reduced the
backlog and dropped the timeliness of case resolution from 147 days to 77 days.
Figure 15 – DCO SIU Workflow
Source: Developed with TSS staff on 06/10/24.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 62
Figure 16 – EVV Workflow
Source: Developed with DHS staff on 06/10/24.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 63
Rationale: DHS is entrusted to provide health and social services to the citizens of Arkansas, and
in doing so has a responsibility to ensure that services are provided effectively and efficiently to those
citizens who meet the eligibility requirements, to those providers who meet the enrollment criteria,
and for those services that comply to the policies, procedures, and reimbursement rates.
Unfortunately, there are some individuals and vendors who attempt to defraud the department, and
the department has the obligation to identify, investigate, and resolve these situations.
After finding FWA, it is imperative that DHS act swiftly and effectively. If the matter involves provider
fraud, DHS should work closely with OMIG. If the matter involves beneficiary overpayment or fraud,
DHS should move to resolve, collect recovery and, in some cases refer to the county attorney for
criminal investigation. Backlogs make it difficult to do so, thus reducing backlog of cases is essential.
Also, having the data and analytics at the front end of the process enables cost avoidance, thus
increasing prevention. All of these require that a clear, consistent, and concise policy be kept up to
date and any changes are promulgated quickly. Ambiguity in policy leaves the department vulnerable
to FWA.
Implementation Considerations: The Office of Security and Compliance, the Office of Payment
Integrity, and the DCO Special Investigations Unit will coordinate this initiative. Representatives
from these units as well as the Department of Inspector General’s Office of Medicaid Inspector
General will collaborate to complete several actions steps to ensure the success of this initiative.
Moreover, to the extent that additional state, federal or commercial data is used in a predictive and
preventative matter, through an aggregator or data hub, DHS should also ensure collaboration with
TSS, as this is consistent with Arkansas Forward’s goal and strategy to enhance shared services and
ensure alignment and leveraging of buying power and operations statewide.
Appendix A provides the Work Plan containing action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with DHS staff and review of other state best practices include:
• Examining existing policies and procedures, making improvements, when necessary.
• Enhancing collaboration with the OMIG by reviewing key process steps used by both
departments and ensuring there is no duplication in Medicaid investigations processes. If
required, review and revise the current Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the
two departments to articulate the duties, task, timelines, and responsibilities of each
department.
• Continue building on quarterly meetings with DIG and Attorney General Medicaid Fraud
Control Unit to ensure strategic alignment of programs, review process improvement
opportunities, discuss investigation findings and mitigation strategies, and share best
practices.
• Consider expanding the current pilot that manages eligibility fraud cases from beginning to
end. It will be necessary to determine how to adequately resource this effort without
compromising the quality assurance activity.
• Enhancing efforts to improve the number of non-SNAP related eligibility activities by focusing
on Medicaid and other DHS programs eligibility.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 64
• Augment data collection and analytics by examining the possibilities of accessing alternative
data sources like the all-payer database or childcare system.
• Work with TSS and other agencies to address cross-department fraud, waste, and abuse data
needs (exploration of multi-agency data warehouse and effective use of All Payor Claims
Database).
• Examine opportunities for predictive analytics and front-end eligibility and financial tools to
assist identification and investigation. An RFI for this area has been posted and is under
review, which should generate new potential ideas in this area.
• Establish a clear definition of what constitutes fraud, waste, and abuse.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
The success of the initiative will be dependent on identifying risks and mitigating these risks. The
following are risks identified to date:
• New data and analytics capabilities poorly correlated with actual PI and FWA issues.
Mitigation by using a specialized vendor and learning from other state programs (e.g.,
benefits department) in and outside of DHS.
• Lack of in-house talent with AI, data mining, and advanced analytics. Mitigation by identifying
a vendor partner to develop capabilities and support ongoing data and analytics operations.
DHS is looking to issue and RFP in the next couple of years.
• New policies and processes not followed consistently or in line with intent. Mitigation by
using the inclusion of responsible team members in the development of new processes and
policies.
• The reallocation of staff could negatively compromise other areas. Mitigation by continuing
monitoring the affected units’ activities.
• Lack of understanding new polices and how to use new tools. Mitigation with proper training.
• Policy and system changes take too long. Mitigation by developing a process diagram to
determine where barriers and workflow changes could speed up the process.
• Improvement to the front end and identification could increase cases, causing backlog.
Mitigation: Track volume and timeliness.
Other state examples illustrating approaches to enhancing Program Integrity and FWA include
examples that:
• Use multiple data sources to identify FWA
• Establish collaborative relationships with other agencies, commercial entities and
stakeholders
• Use technology to establish risk levels to triage and prioritize resources
• Use data analytics in a predictive manner to prevent future fraud, waste and abuse
Texas
Texas created a data warehouse and developed predictive analytics algorithms to apply a risk score
to households applying for assistance. Figure 17 lists the data sources that Texas used to generate
reports. Each report will include a risk level and a summary to describe the information causing the
risk level for the household. The following information is the source to generate a report:
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 65
• Eligibility System information entered for everyone (name, address, Date of Birth (DOB) and
Social Security Number (SSN), if applicable)
• Information obtained from state and federal data sources for each individual age 16 and
older.
• Additional data from third party data sources
• The information identifies as potentially questionable information determines the overall
Risk Level and applies to the entire household. The Risk Levels range from lowest to highest.
Risk Level Examples that can be configurable are:
Low Risk
• Input SSN might have been mis-keyed.
• Input address is not consumer's best, most current address.
• Adult household member(s) income greater than program income limit
High Risk
• The client currently owns out-of-state property.
• The owner of the property of the application address may be living in the household.
• SSN or Case Number matched on latest EBT Out-of-State Shopping Report
• Potential Fraud
• Input identity reported as deceased.
• Individual address is outside of Texas.
• The client is currently incarcerated.
Referrals can be than triaged into different priority and/or risk levels.
Figure 17 – Data Sources
Texas State Data Sources
• Tx Bureau of Vital Statistics (BVS) • Tx Division of Motor Vehicles (DMV)
Marriage and Divorce Motor Vehicle Registration
• Tx Office of Attorney General (OAG) • Tx Workforce Commission (TWC)
Child Support Quarterly Wages and Unemployment
• Tx HHSC Quality Control (QC) • Tx Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ)
QC Sanctions Correction Facilities
• Tx Lottery Commission (TLC) • Tx Department of Public Safety (DPS)
• Tx HHSC Lone Star Business Services (LSBS) Driver’s license Registration
EBT Out of State Shopping • Tx HHSC Integrity Support Services (ISS)
• Tx Employer New Hire Report (ENHR) Previous ISS Findings
Employer New Hires Potential Identity Theft
Lottery Winnings
Federal Data Sources
• US Citizenship and Immigration Services • Electronic Disqualified Recipient System
(USCIS) (eDRS)
Citizenship & Immigration Disqualified Recipient
• National Directory of New Hires (NDNH) • Federal Data Services Hub (FDSH)
National New Hires
Commercial Data Sources
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 66
• Accuity • Lexis Nexis
• Price Digests • Experian
• Equifax
Arizona
Arizona sponsors a semi-annual meeting that includes representatives from all MCO Compliance
Officers, all program integrity staff and other state divisions, the Attorney General’s Office, and CMS
Regional Office staff. The meetings provide training, introducing fresh staff, updates on new
initiatives and activities, and a means of networking. More referrals resulted and sharing of
information on an ongoing basis increased.
Florida, Maine, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Rhode Island, and Washington are some other
states that use multi-agency and health plans regular meetings to enhance communication and
collaboration.
Ohio
The Ohio Department of Job and Family Services (ODJFS) is responsible for UI and Pandemic
Unemployment Assistance (PUA). As ODJFS began to process new claims during the pandemic,
they soon were inundated with fraud.
ODJFS turned to the Ohio Department of Administrative Services (DAS) and its InnovateOhio
Platform (IOP) Data and Analytics team for help. ODJFS asked IOP to combine data from its two
unemployment data systems, as well as other relevant state data, to create a fraud dashboard.
This dashboard assisted in identifying potential fraud and provided the means to prioritize cases.
This initiative provided a quick response, workflow improvement and better results.
Washington
Identifying waste is a critical function to ensure the health and safety of our citizens. The
Washington Health Alliance (WHA) within its All-payer claims database (APCD) implemented a cost
calculator to identify wasteful health care services. The analysis revealed about $282 million was
spent on wasteful health care for 622,000 Washington residents.
Utah
Utah’s All Payer Claims Database allows the state to analyze complete episodes of care, from initial
diagnosis through treatment and follow-up.
Rhode Island
The United States Attorney General merged Rhode Island’s Medicaid and Medicare data and found
that one of the state’s substance abuse providers was providing more than 24 hours of care daily.
Over $26 million dollars in fraud was identified.
Recommended steps for establishing improved DHS’ PI function (future state):
Phase 1
• Create a working group with DIG OMIG to govern and coordinate PI / FWA initiative.
• Collaborate with providers and vendors to update PI policies based on findings of policy
review.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 67
• Determine a standardized definition of what constitutes fraud, waste, and abuse, and
develop policies and procedures as to what cases should be referred for investigation.
• Create a workgroup within DHS to analyze, coordinate, and develop beneficiary payment
integrity activities and make recommendations for improvement and process change for all
public assistance programs.
• Conduct baseline capabilities, policies, and outcomes analysis for DHS payment integrity
and DIG OMIG and identify areas with greatest potential value from investment.
• Develop a Payment Integrity Survey to be distributed to all entities who have PI
responsibilities in and outside DHS.
• Examine the value of having a declared Public Fraud Prevention Week.
• Establish a new communication and collaboration framework between DHS and DIG.
• Examine alternative data sources such as death of death, business address moves, identify
thief breeches at the front end of provider enrollment.
• Establish KPIs to measure outcomes from new policies, systems, and collaborations;
conduct baseline measurements.
• Develop training for new policies and tools.
Phase 2
• Enhance data collection, analysis, and sharing to ensure timely identification and corrective
action on potential fraud, waste, or abuse.
• Examine the opportunity to create a centralized data warehouse.
• Identify elevated risk cases and opportunities for fraud.
• Examine the opportunity to develop a front-end tool to triage households buy risk scoring
case for potential fraud and enable prioritization.
• Re-measure KPIs to understand progress and identify areas for additional strengthening.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative seeks to
deploy existing staff resources efficiently, modifying allocation of staff time, or reallocation of staff;
no additional staffing is required. Staff may require additional training and skill development,
including data analytics, to achieve the intent of this recommendation. DHS can consult states
highlighted in this report or engage a contractor to support staff development. However, the
utilization of new tools, policies, and processes may generate an increase in referrals that could
result in re-examining staffing models.
There will be additional information technology needs due to potential system updates, potential
implementation of new data, analytics, and control. Current vendors may need to make changes.
Additionally, third party contractors may be needed but should be eligible for enhance federal match.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: DHS will
need to prioritize changes to policies, procedures, and information system changes. DHS will also
need to develop training materials in association with any changes. There will also be a need to
establish and adhere to standardized meetings with partners by creating agendas and assigning a
scribe to take minutes. This initiative has the potential to impact not only DHS, but OMIG and the
Attorney General’s office for referral, intake/prioritization, and investigations processes. The number
of cases may increase, but correspondently so should not number of recoveries and avoidance.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 68
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
performance measures of this initiative are to increase the volume of collections and recoveries,
increase the number of incredible referrals while reducing the number of unlikely ones, and increase
the number of substantiated investigations. There is also an expectation that the backlog will reduce
and cost savings/recoveries increase. The implementation of any new data analytics must generate
a positive return on investment.
The expected impact is that the time to update the claims system with FWA investigation outcomes
will reduce. Recoveries will increase. The timeline to identify FWA will decrease. SNAP fraud
identification will increase, thus improving the department’s SNAP error rate.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: This initiative is estimated to have the potential for approximately $45.0 million in
anticipated savings within two years of this initiative launch. This is due primarily to an increase in
case identification, enabled by analytics, resulting in recoveries and cost avoidance.
To place this number in context and demonstrate its achievability, in Texas, the OIG is a department
included in the broader Health and Human Services Commission. As an HHSC agency, OIG has
access to a data broker contract/vendor, which has been in place for 25 years. The vendor has
entered into Memoranda of Understanding with other state and federal entities to leverage available
data at no additional state cost except for construction of the data broker interface to connect to
these data sources. Additional commercial data sources are also integrated into this system. In the
first three quarters of 2024 alone, Texas OIG has recovered $342.5 million from providers and
beneficiaries.36 This has included provider/MCO recoveries and beneficiary recoveries for programs
including Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program; Women, Infants, and Children; Medicaid;
Temporary Assistance for Needy Families; and the Children’s Health Insurance Program.
Change Management Plan: Development of clear and concise policies, procedures, and training
combined with innovative technologies will improve DHS’s ability to identify, investigate and recover
fraud, waste, and abuse. This will be augmented by continuing to collaborate and communicate with
all Payment Integrity stakeholders. Key activities and timing for communication plan are included in
Appendix A – Work Plan and summarized in Figure 18.
DHS can leverage the DHS communications team as well as language guides and resources to
ensure communications are meaningful and person-centered.
Figure 18 – DHS-7 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• Internal DHS Division • What is fraud, waste, or • Website • Janet Mann
Staff abuse? • Handouts • Brett Hayes
• DHS Shared Services • What are the new • Communication • Jonathan Bibbs
Communications Team policies, or with External
• Individuals/beneficiaries procedures? Stakeholders
• What new suspicious
• Parents/caretakers
activities noted?
• Medical Providers
36
Texas OIG, Q3 Fiscal Year 2024 Quarterly Report.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 69
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• Youth and child welfare • The State of Arkansas • Messaging
organizations can realize significant delivered via
• Health Plans benefits with expanded text, email, etc.
• PASSE entities data analytics in fraud • Stakeholder
and abuse surveys
• Medicaid Fraud Control
identification and • Policy Memo
Unit
investigation. • Face-to-face
• Attorney General office • DHS will implement the meetings
• County Prosecutors safeguards needed to • Teleconference
• Child Care Provider protect shared data.
• SNAP Providers • DHS is building the
• Other public assistance internal capabilities
state agencies to leverage data
• Other public assistance use.
vendors • Collaboration with
all PI partners will
assist in fulfilling
this initiative.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 70
Initiative DHS #8 - Focus on talent targeting and career development
This initiative seeks to improve DHS’s ability to target and attract talent and to develop careers paths
for employees to improve the employee experience and continually develop skills needed to deliver
the best service to Arkansans.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DHS leadership interviews and focus groups conducted
in June 2024 identified several key themes regarding DHS’ workforce, including the inability to attract
top talent. One leader indicated the “Arkansas pay plan is so deficient” and most agreed “workforce
is DHS’s largest challenge.” Commonly cited workforce challenges included:
• Low compensation and/or not competitive with the private sector;
• No career ladder;
• Lack of resources;
• Little to no flexibility with salary adjustments or moving positions to areas of high need and,
• Work-life balance for difficult DHS jobs.
Critical workforce shortages and needs highlighted by DHS were cited in the areas of Medicaid
Finance, Nursing, and Division of Children and Families frontline staff.
• Medicaid Finance has become increasingly complex. DHS requires additional expertise in
this area to ensure DHS maximizes federal funding as well as remains aware of the growing
financial complexities that come with the Medicaid financing, cost allocation, and blending
and braiding of funds.
• Being able to hire qualified nurses that can conduct long-term care assessments and other
required health functions within its divisions is critical to the DHS Mission.
• Achieving quality outcomes for children and families served by DCFS is directly aligned with
DHS’ ability to build a high-quality, professional, and stable workforce with a manageable
workload. Child protective services workers provide a unique and essential service. The work
is a complex and challenging job, requiring significant mental and emotional demands.37 As
a result, the field has seen significant levels of turnover for more than three decades. 38 DHS
turnover and the inability to attract new candidates impacts the continuity and stability of
services for the families they serve, but also creates instability in the workplace through
increased workload and the depletion of skilled workers.
Because DHS requires these key staff positions, a common theme reported by leadership was the
practice of paying contractors at higher rates than salaries that would be required to compensate
DHS staff to do the job. Compensation is a critical element for recruiting and retention success in
more challenging careers and positions. The lack of a strong compensation strategy and salary
progression signals to potential applicants limited opportunities and the unpredictability of rewards.
Even after the Covid-19 Pandemic, the current labor market continues to present challenges to both
private and public sector employers at all levels. The combination of the pandemic, changing
perceptions of the workplace to include remote work options, shifting employer needs, and life
37
Kothari et al., “Retention of child welfare caseworkers: The role of case severity and workplace resources,”
Children and Youth Services Review, July 2021. Annie E. Casey Foundation, 2003.
38
(Lipien et al., 2020).
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 71
priorities all perpetuate skill shortages in key categories and industries. In 2023, DHS recognized the
benefits of remote work options for its staff as well as the need to balance a remote work privilege
with the inherently people-centered work conducted by DCFS and adopted a remote work policy.
Employees who are approved for remote work must produce and complete job assignments at the
same level as working in the office during normal business hours.
Finally, the Arkansas legislature, recognizing the issue related to the need for all agencies, including
DHS, to attract talented candidates, especially in these workforce areas, passed Act 172 in the 2024
session. Section 21-5-227 of the Act allows for “Special compensation awards” “to recognize an
employee’s outstanding performance in successfully completing a significant project or job
assignment or completing a major project milestone…” 39 The department determines whether to
offer the special compensation award and it can be a lump sum bonus not to exceed $5,000 per
award and up to 40 hours of incentive leave that shall be used at the end of the calendar year. It still
will require Governor, Legislative and Administrative approval and the impacted divisions at DHS
have yet to create these specific recognition plans. We have also been advised by DHS that it will be
difficult to grant additional leave as an incentive when shift coverage is one of the main drivers for
creating the recognition in the first place.
Human service leaders have long Figure 19 – DHS Filled/Unfilled Positions, July 2024
recognized the value of organizational
stability to achieve desired outcomes. The
impact of instability and an inexperienced
workforce has severe consequences in
many fields, but exponentially more in
human services. The need for a well-
trained, experienced, and those
committed to the mission of human
services are critical to achieving the best
outcomes for the children and families
served.
As of 7/8/2024, overall DHS, had 923
unfilled positions (12.5% of overall filled
positions), as illustrated in Figure 19, provided by DHS. 40
DHS is struggling to recruit and retain qualified workforce both in Medicaid and in other critical
finance roles. According to DHS staff, DHS is currently paying approximately $250 per hour on
average for these services on various finance contracts (staffing, federal reporting, actuarial
services, supplemental payment work). DHS has identified specific issues relating to the ability to
attract and retain specialized Medicaid and health related positions that are essential to DHS
fulfilling its mission. Many of these Medicaid finance experts are working for consulting agencies
being paid sometimes two to three times as much as they can make in the public sector in Arkansas.
39
Arkansas Legislature,
https://www.arkleg.state.ar.us/Bills/Detail?id=sb77&ddBienniumSession=2023%2F2024F
40
DHS, “Bi-weekly Change Report,” 07.05.2024-APP to DHS.pdf
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 72
DHS has experienced a severe shortage of nurses, especially at the Human Development Centers
(HDCs), the Arkansas State Hospital (ASH), and the Arkansas Health Center (AHC). For FY23, the
turnover rate at DHS for MP01-MP04 nursing classifications was 44.27%, (51.09% at DHS facilities)
compared to the overall state turnover rate of 15.6%. The turnover rate for LPNs at DHS facilities was
45.99%, compared to the overall state turnover rate of 22.75%.
• DHS has proposed a 25% increase above entry for new hires, along with a 1% per non-state
year grid and a 1.5% per state year grid. Additionally, shift and geographic differentials would
be available to further support competitive compensation.
• For nursing classifications, grades MP01 – MP04, DHS proposed a 10% increase above entry
for new hires, along with a 0.5% per non-state year grid and a 1% per state year grid. The OPM
differential of up to 10% would also be available to nurses providing direct care to clients, in
addition to geographic and shift differentials at all facilities.
Other identified areas where DHS is struggling with recruiting and retaining workforce is with Family
Service Workers in DCFS and Division of Youth Services staff. Arkansas’ starting Family Service
Worker (trainee) salary is a GS04 with a minimum salary of $32,405 and midpoint of $42,046. The
majority of Family Service Workers and Specialists are a GS06, with a starting salary at $36,155 and
a midpoint of $46,912. As shown in Figure 20, Arkansas’ Family Service Worker’s pay scale is
considerably less than a sample of 11 comparison states, as well as the average salary for state child
protective service worker of $63,478.64.
Figure 20 – National CPS Case Worker Salaries
National CPS Salary
Starting Average
New York $ 55,463.00 $ 76,759.00
California $ 58,838.00 $ 65,812.00
Pennsylvania $ 48,551.00 $ 59,547.00
Michigan $ 47,000.00 $ 58,891.00
New Jersey $ 57,402.00 $ 62,000.00
Texas $ 54,315.00
Illinois $ 52,944.00 $ 73,443.00
Missouri $ 57,000.00 $ 59,000.00
Nevada $ 53,966.00 $ 60,829.00
Colorado $ 64,053.00 $ 64,053.00
Iowa $ 50,731.00 $ 63,616.00
Avg $ 54,594.80 $ 63,478.64
Source: Consultant Team Estimate 41
41
Sources include a sample of state child welfare websites, www.indeed.com, www.salary.com. U.S. News
and World Report, “Child and Family Social Worker Salary,” https://money.usnews.com/careers/best-
jobs/child-and-family-social-
worker/salary#:~:text=Best%2DPaying%20States%20for%20Child,%2C%20and%20Maryland%20(%2466%2
C850).
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 73
According to Zippia.com (the Career Expert) website, Arkansas ranks 49th out of 51 on the average
pay for all children service worker jobs nationwide. Note: these positions include all children service
positions and not just child protection.42 The lower pay grades also have led to many vacancies for
the Family Service Worker and Specialist staff. Figure 21 shows all Family Service position
classification in DCFS and whether filled or vacant.43
Figure 21 – Vacancies by DHS Family Service Position Classification, July 2024
Position Total Filled Vacant
Family Services Assistant 6 6 0
Family Service Worker 577 413 164
Family Service Worker Specialist 143 132 11
Family Services Program Coordinator 1 1 0
Family Service Worker Clinical Specialist 21 15 6
Family Service Worker Supervisor 162 145 17
Family Worker County Supervisor 28 27 1
Total 938 739 199
Source: Department of Human Services.
In 2022, DCFS implemented a “teaming approach pilot” in Pulaski County with some promising
results. DCFS was able to fill some key leadership positions and begin the structure to the teaming
approach in Pulaski County. However, given the number of vacancies and the turnover, a complete
teaming model has not been implemented. Some of the positions for the teaming model have also
already been vacated. DCFS did utilize three of the Program Assistant positions to pilot Educational
Specialists. Their function is to support frontline Family Service Workers in ensuring that children in
foster care have all their needs met. The staff in these positions monitor children with Individualized
Education Programs/504 plans, attend meetings at the school, and can identify how many children
in that county assigned are receiving services. The position is also tasked with relationship building
and collaboration with the school districts.
The Division of Youth Services has similar pay grades for its staff working with youth and maintains a
similar high vacancy rate due to the inability to hire and retain qualified staff within the current GS
labor grades, shown in Figure 22.
Figure 22 – Vacancies by DYS Position, July 2024
Count of Sum of Sum of
Position Positions Positions
Row Labels Number Filled Vacant
GS03 23
SECURITY OFFICER 14 8 6
YOUTH PROGRAM SPECIALIST 9 6 3
GS04 6
ADMINISTRATIVE SPECIALIST III 4 3 1
42
Zippia, “ Children's Service Worker Salary “ https://www.zippia.com/salaries/children-s-service-worker/
43
Data provided by DHS.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 74
Count of Sum of Sum of
Position Positions Positions
Row Labels Number Filled Vacant
INVENTORY CONTROL MANAGER 1 0 1
SECURITY OFFICER SUPERVISOR 1 0 1
GS05 10
YOUTH PROGRAM COORDINATOR 10 9 1
GS06 38
ADMINISTRATIVE ANALYST 2 2 0
CERTIFIED BACHELORS TEACHER 6 1 5
DHS BEHAV HLTH CASE REVIEW ANALYST 2 1 1
DHS PROGRAM SPECIALIST 10 3 7
GRANTS ANALYST 1 1 0
GRANTS SPECIALIST 1 1 0
INTERNAL AFFAIRS INVESTIGATOR 2 1 1
MILITARY PROGRAM COORDINATOR 3 3 0
YOUTH SERVICES ADVISOR 11 10 1
GS07 13
DHS PROGRAM COORDINATOR 6 6 0
EDUCATION & INSTRUCTION SPECIALIST 5 4 1
STAFF DEVELOPMENT COORDINATOR 2 2 0
GS08 17
CERTIFIED MASTERS TEACHER 3 2 1
DHS PROGRAM MANAGER 11 9 2
QUALITY ASSURANCE COORDINATOR 2 2 0
YOUTH PROGRAM MANAGER 1 1 0
GS09 8
DHS PROGRAM ADMINISTRATOR 6 6 0
SPECIAL EDUCATION SUPERVISOR 1 1 0
YOUTH PROGRAM DIRECTOR 1 1 0
GS11 1
DYS ACADEMIC ADMINISTRATOR 1 1 0
GS12 1
BEHAV HLTH ASST DIR CHILDRENS SVS 1 1 0
GS13 3
DHS BEHAV HLTH CHILDRENS SYSTEM CARE
DIR 1 1 0
DHS/DBHS DIR ALCOHOL & DRUG ABUSE
PREV 1 1 0
MANAGING ATTORNEY 1 1 0
MP01 2
REGISTERED NURSE 2 1 1
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 75
Count of Sum of Sum of
Position Positions Positions
Row Labels Number Filled Vacant
SE02 1
DHS DIVISION DIRECTOR 1 1 0
Grand Total 123 90 33
Source: Department of Human Services.
Compensation is part of the equation and is being addressed through the Personnel Plan
workstream in the Arkansas Forward Project to help alleviate some of the salary issues currently
experienced within DHS. While compensation matters to those in the public sector there are other
motivating factors that are aptly captured in Figure 23. 44
Figure 23 – State government talent challenges
Source: McKinsey & Company, 2022.
The costs associated with recruiting, hiring, and training new state employees can be considerable,
with some estimates of replacing an employee ranging from approximately 16% to 200% of spending
on annual salaries 45; by other estimates, 150% of a departed employee’s annual salary. 46
44
2022 Great Attrition, Great Attraction 2.0 global survey - Public Sector
45
Government Executive, “What Keeps Public Employees In Their Jobs? It’s Not Just Pay,” January 11, 2023,
https://www.govexec.com/management/2023/01/what-keeps-public-employees-their-jobs-its-not-just-
pay/381709/#:~:text=Turnover%20among%20government%20employees%20is,experience%20required%20
for%20the%20job.
46
Route 50, “Replacing a Government Employee Can Cost 150% of Worker's Salary,” July 22, 2021,
https://www.route-fifty.com/workforce/2021/07/replacing-government-employee-can-cost-150-workers-
salary/183989/
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 76
Rationale: This initiative recommends that DHS target and attract talent and develop careers paths
for employees to improve the employee experience and continually develop skills needed to deliver
the best service to Arkansans.
• Target: skills demand forecasting, current skills assessments
• Attract: employee value proposition assessment, financial and non-financial recruiting
incentives, new sources of talent, more flexible hiring bonuses
• Develop career paths: Work with OPM to develop career paths within and across
departments to open up opportunities for advancement and enhance skills development
and sharing of best practices to improve overall experience and effectiveness of Arkansas
state government
The development of career paths through the implementation of specialized training, leadership
development and incorporating mentorship DHS and the state may have the opportunity to increase
talent identification of highly qualified individuals, improve retention, and increase internal
promotion. In addition, the State of Arkansas may benefit from the increased production of high
quality and well-trained employees delivering services.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – DHS Work Plan provides the action steps in the
recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with department staff and
review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Revise DHS policy 1131 to allow hiring of remote, out-of-state IT talent to enable filling IT
positions with in-state technical talent.
• Consider changes in required education and experience in DCFS in alignment with best
practice outlined below.
• Assign dedicated DHS staff to collaborate with OPM and oversee the development of the
programs.
• Conduct regular feedback sessions to understand and address any concerns, offer
incentives for participation, and ensure programs are aligned with career aspirations for
identified talent.
Examples from other states related to top Arkansas DHS staffing priorities include:
Specialized – Child Welfare Professionals
In the past, some states, including Texas, Florida and New Mexico, have advocated for specific
degree requirements for child welfare professionals. However, numerous studies from both the child
welfare and business management literature suggest that specific educational and work experience
are weak predictors of turnover in most organizational contexts. 47 New Mexico abandoned the Social
Work degree requirement and Florida has recently allowed related experience to substitute for post-
secondary education. Texas will now accept candidates with a 2-year associate’s degree and related
experience.
47
Van Iddekinge et al., 2019; Perry, 2006; Nissly et al., 2005; Rosenthal et al., 1998.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 77
To assist in attracting candidates from a very tight labor market, one state in particular, Florida,
expanded its candidate profile for individuals performing child welfare services to include related
work experience to substitute for post-secondary education. Individuals with an associate degree
from an accredited college or 60+ college credits from an accredited college or university and one of
the following:
• Two years of professional work experience or,
• Two years of full-time social work or human services experience
Examples of professional work experience could be, although not limited to: Guardian Ad Litem or
similar child advocate role, family support worker, teacher’s assistant/aide, childcare
provider/worker, therapeutic assistant, behavior health technician, home health aide, nurse (LPN or
RN), Emergency Medical Services (EMS), or other professional jobs that require an assessment of
factors that can contribute to trauma or protective capacities with children and families. Additionally,
candidates with a high school diploma or GED equivalent and four+ years of full-time social work or
human services experience can be considered.
Texas HHSC Leadership Program
Other states have successfully offered state-wide, multi-stage leadership training to help identify,
develop, and retain public sector employees. Figure 24 outlines a best practice from the Texas
Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC), which has developed a leadership program
consisting of four modules, two programs and two “academies” to serve four departments. Through
this leadership program HHSC has reached 53,000 employees of HHSC. The program has existed
for 12 years, with a retention rate of ~70% for all employees who have completed the program and
an advancement rate of ~50%. HHSC program staff indicate that the rewards of their program are
that the programs are highly visible, help further growth, and participants are able to network with
agency employee with whom they would otherwise never work. Graduates receive certificates as
well as training hours.
Figure 24 – Best Practice: Texas Health and Human Services Commission
Program Program Features
• Meant for high performing individuals, not managers or supervisors,
that want to grow within their own skill set and within agency.
• Four months in duration and it is 100% virtual.
• Program consists of four sessions and then a graduation ceremony.
The sessions are 1.5-2 days.
• The purpose of ECP is for the employees to “Own Their Influence.”
They are taught that leadership is influence and they leave with
understanding that they take ownership of that principle.
Extraordinary Contributors
• Participants are paired up with a “Transitional Mentor” – a front-line
Program (ECP)
manager that has made the transition to manager in the last two
years. The Transitional Mentor is supposed to connect with the
mentee on at least 4 sessions outside the program sessions.
• Participants are asked to do projects and come up with
recommendations, for example: how do you make meetings
meaningful?
• This program offers an opportunity to serve as coach; participants
get a book called “Active Coaching” and receive a ½ day or full day
of coaching.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 78
Program Program Features
• The program puts participants in groups of six, which helps develop
an bond with five peers.
• Participants are high performing individuals who want to move into
management or supervision.
• Program assesses whether employees are equipped to make the
shift mentally and emotionally to leadership roles: are employees
individual contributions to a team or someone who can lead a
team?
Aspiring Leaders Program • Focus on the different mental and emotional skill set needed to
(ALP) supervise people.
• Objective for program is clarity – do they really want to supervise
people?
• The program is 4 months in duration; with 1.5 day sessions
occurring approximately every 3 weeks.
• The program offers a hybrid option of in-person or Zoom
participation.
• The academy is for those new to the management and the
leadership ladder.
Rising Leaders Academy (RLA) • Attendees are taught from book “The Five Dysfunctions of the
Team” by Patrick Lencioni.
• This academy includes in-depth leadership learning.
• A 360 Self-Assessment is required for each participant.
• The Executive Leadership academy is for senior leaders, senior
managers and directors, to help prepare for executive leadership.
Executive Leadership • Unlike other leadership programs, for this academy, the head of the
Academy agency must approve a candidate’s attendance.
• A 360 Self-Assessment is required and candidates must also
complete a leadership development plan.
• Attendees are assigned a mentor.
Source: Interview with Texas Health and Human Services Commission official.
For the ECP and ALP programs, participants complete an application, which a manager has to
approve. Applications are based on first come first served. Program cohorts are limited to 36
participants for these for these programs. For the Academies, seats are selected by the executives
in the agency. Academies meet for a total of six months. For all the programs, there is homework and
prework, and for ELA, participants must come back to give a 15-minute presentation after they have
completed the program.
HHSC reviews their leadership program every two years. Evaluations by participants are based on
three principles: was the content relevant, reliable and applicable. Program staff at HHSC stressed
that important factors of the program’s success are 1. That they do not spend time on agency
information and do not have directors or bureau heads come in to give talks; 2. They do not use a
traditional classroom; 3. They do not use the words “training” or “curriculum” or “info dump” - their
programs instead aim to be “fluid and organic” and focused on applicable tools that are relevant to
being applied now. For graduates of their programs, there is an Alumni Association, which enables
graduates to continue their leadership development. Alumni have access to an alumni list serve and
there is also a newsletter that is sent out to graduates.
Mentoring in Government
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 79
Mentoring is a process that focuses specifically on providing guidance, direction, and career advice.
Mentoring programs can be either a standalone program or part of a training and development
program within an organization. Organizations, including federal agencies run standalone formal
mentoring programs to enhance career and personal development. 48
The United States Office of Personnel Management (OPM) has developed the OPM Best Practices:
Mentoring document which is a tool that assists agencies in creating a business case for mentoring
by outlining critical steps in developing and implementing a formal mentoring program. The U.S.
Patent and Trademark Office has created a Mentoring Program Toolkit that can be useful in
developing a mentoring program.
Multiple federal agencies have implemented successful mentoring programs and the details for
those can be found on the OPM’s Training and Development Policy Wiki noted in the footnote below.
Recommended steps to target and attract talent and develop careers paths:
• Establish working group with OPM stakeholder and (optionally) HR leads from other agencies
• Further assess current critical areas for DHS talent and career development, such as
Employee Value Proposition for roles with high reliance on external contractors and
forecasting of future skills needs.
• Conduct a compensation analysis of DHS jobs to similar private sector jobs and a
comparative market study by position type with like size states.
• Identify new sources of talent, such as partnerships with universities and community
organizations, and develop strategies to engage with these sources.
• Develop more flexible hiring bonuses that align with the needs of the organization and the
availability of funding; revise appropriation if needed; work with Department of Finance and
Administration (DFA) to access performance pay budget.
• Work with OPM to develop career paths within and across departments to open up
opportunities for advancement and enhance skills development.
• Develop financial and non-financial recruiting incentives to attract new talent, such as
signing bonuses, relocation assistance, and flexible work arrangements; adjust policies as
needed.
• Develop a strategic marketing and recruitment plan that contains a complete profile of the
ideal candidate, a more creative and targeted analysis of the best places to source for talent,
and positive branding and messaging to promote positive occupational awareness about the
DHS positions.
• Create a mandatory and rigorous, realistic job preview process as part of the DHS hiring
process and completed before an application is submitted that will improve the
understanding of the role, increase the quality of the applicant pool, and create incoming job
expectations.
• Focus on early career education for human services opportunities with high school and
college students.
48
Office of Personnel Management, “Training and Development Policy Wiki,”
https://www.opm.gov/wiki/training/mentoring-and-coaching.ashx.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 80
• Develop and deploy a community awareness campaign to increase understanding and
desirability of human services as a career.
• Develop a digital-based employment branding plan to increase the size and quality of
candidate pools
• Create recruitment partnerships with universities to offer job shadowing and internship
opportunities.
• Use the expanded candidate profile for individuals performing child welfare work to allow
qualified candidates without a 4-year degree but have an associate’s degree and/or the
specified background and substitute experience.
• Define specific KPIs to measure success of talent and career development initiative, identify
or create new data to measure performance, and measure current performance.
• Monitor and evaluate the effectiveness of the talent targeting and attraction strategies and
career development programs. Use data analytics and performance metrics to assess the
impact of the changes and identify areas for further improvement.
• Continuously review and update the talent targeting and attraction strategies and career
development.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Based on interviews with
DHS leadership, DHS would need to collaborate with OPM to support this initiative to build career
paths, develop specialized training, leadership training and a mentoring program.
Estimation of department priorities with staffing and resources: Based on DHS initial sizing
of costs, DHS expects that that the initiative can be accomplished through existing appropriations. It
is anticipated existing human resources staff would coordinate these new initiatives.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: Training
and development of staff can help employees learn or strengthen skills; increase confidence,
motivation and productivity. Leadership programs and mentoring create community. Best practice
adoption builds credibility. To retain skilled employees and develop future leaders, it’s critical to
understand employee career objectives and align them with organizational goals. This initiative
enables both career development and leadership development to help employees gain new skills
and feel engaged with peers, management and DHS. By encouraging a learning culture DHS ensures
that employees take an active role in spreading knowledge and best practices throughout their
organization. These factors all lead to happier employees and better employee retention for a
stronger, more effective organization.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: Proposed metrics to
assess the impact of this initiative include:
• Rate of employee satisfaction (expected to increase);
• Position fill rate (expected to increase);
• Retention and average employee longevity in key positions (expected to increase);
• Time to hire (expected to decrease);
• Turnover rate (expected to decrease);
• Increased number of applications; and,
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 81
• Number of contract applicant pool increases.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: Cost savings and cost avoidance opportunities could be captured in the future,
reduced costs related to overtime and contract staffing, reduced costs related to staff turnover,
reduced overall cost from contracted staff in key areas, and increased retention. As discussed in the
introductory section, this initiative would be accompanied by an upfront initial appropriations
authority and investment to enhance salaries in the mission critical areas identified: Nursing,
Finance, Child Welfare.
Change Management Plan: Clear communication with staff about the purpose for the changes
should accompany any information on the new process changes. Recommended messaging and
modalities are included for each audience in Figure 25. Key activities and timing for communication
plan are included in Appendix A – DHS Work Plan.
Figure 25 – DHS-8 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
All Staff • DHS is embarking on a plan to develop Staff Email HR Director
career paths through specialized training Division Directors
and leadership training as well as the Leadership
development of a mentoring program.
• This will support employee development
and improve customer experience.
• This investment will help DHS better fulfill
its mission.
All Staff • DHS specialized training subject matter Staff Email HR Director
areas Staff Bulletins Division Directors
• DHS Mentoring program opportunities Staff Announcements Leadership
Staff Meetings
Emerging • DHS Leadership training opportunities Staff Email HR Director
Leaders Staff Announcements Division Directors
Staff Meetings Leadership
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 82
Initiative DHS #9 - Deploy Internal Trainings for DHS and Cross-Departmental Staff
This initiative directs DHS to work with the Department of Transformation and Shared Services, Office
of Personnel Management (OPM) in developing and deploying internal trainings across DHS and in
some cases, across departments, delivered at the point of onboarding and on an ongoing basis to
create opportunities for employees to develop skills crucial to delivering best services to Arkansans.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DHS provides very few opportunities for professional
development. If promoted to supervisor, there is a requirement for the leader to complete a 12-hour
training, but there are no other formal training opportunities to support the new leader in developing
a high functioning team. The Human Resources Department does offer a virtual voluntary “Take
Charge Thursday” program that focuses on developing different leadership skills. Previously, DHS
also partnered with the Sam M. Walton College of Business, University of Arkansas to conduct a 10-
month leadership program, but this was a one-time program offering.
Rationale: Organizations with the greatest chance to exceed desired outcomes and thrive into the
future are typically “learning organizations,” meaning that they encourage learning and professional
development at all levels. Developing an internal training program for DHS involves creating a
structured approach to ensure that staff members are well-equipped with the knowledge and skills
they need to perform their roles effectively. Similar to DHS-8, this initiative recognizes that by
providing more opportunities for professional development, DHS and the State of Arkansas broadly
may have the opportunity to increase talent identification of highly qualified individuals, improve
retention, and increase the rate of internal promotion. In addition, the State of Arkansas may benefit
from the increased production of high quality and well-trained employees delivering services.
This initiative will help DHS to create opportunities for employees, especially those in positions
critical to ensuring citizen health and well-being, to grow within DHS and develop skills crucial to
delivering best services to Arkansans. DHS hopes to not only continue to deliver important services,
but to become a “learning organization.” The concept of a learning organization is not new and
although not developed by Peter M. Senge, it was amplified after his book “The Fifth Discipline” was
published in the 1990s. What followed was numerous publications, conferences, and workshops
dedicated to helping organizations become learning organizations. Senge defined a learning
organization as, “organizations where people continually expand their capacity to create results,
where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, collective aspiration is set free, and
where people are continually learning how to learn together.” 49
Learning organizations create a culture that encourages and supports continuous employee
learning, critical thinking, and risk-taking with new ideas. A learning organization is a group of people
skilled at cultivating, acquiring, and transferring knowledge in a supported environment. The learning
organization moves away from basic employee training and shifts its focus to problem solving,
innovation, and real learning. Becoming a learning organization would allow Arkansas DHS to
develop a group of people that have the opportunity for enhanced and continuous learning
integrated into their culture and business practice model.
49
The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 83
Designing an effective training program requires dedicated human resources staff and includes a
number of phases and elements that moves from assessing needs to identifying goals to curriculum
design and development into implementation, evaluation and measurement as demonstrated in
Figure 26 below.
Figure 26 – Internal Training Program Development Phases
Phases Steps
• Identify Objectives: Determine the core competencies required for different
roles within the department (e.g., case management, social services,
administrative support).
Needs
• Assess Skills Gap: Evaluate current skills and knowledge gaps through surveys,
Assessment
interviews, and performance reviews.
• Regulatory Requirements: Incorporate any mandatory training related to legal
and regulatory requirements for DHS.
• Core Competencies: Outline key competencies and skills to be developed (e.g.,
Define Training empathy, client interaction, data management).
Goals • Learning Outcomes: Establish clear, measurable learning outcomes for each
training module.
Core Module Examples:
• Introduction to Health and Human Services: Overview of the department’s
mission, structure, and key functions.
• Client Interaction and Communication: Techniques for effective
communication, active listening, and conflict resolution.
• Case Management: Procedures for managing client cases, including intake,
assessment, and follow-up.
• Ethics and Confidentiality: Training on ethical standards, confidentiality, and
handling sensitive information.
Design the
• Cultural Competency: Understanding and working with diverse populations.
Curriculum
• Regulations and Compliance: Overview of relevant laws, regulations, and
policies.
• Emergency Response: Procedures for handling crises and emergencies.
Advanced Module Examples:
• Leadership and Supervision: Skills for managing teams and projects.
• Data Analysis and Reporting: Techniques for analyzing client data and
generating reports.
• Program Evaluation: Methods for assessing the effectiveness of services and
programs.
• Content Creation: Develop training materials, including manuals, presentations,
e-learning modules, and case studies.
Develop
• Resources: Utilize external resources such as industry publications, online
Training
courses, and expert speakers.
Materials
• Interactive Elements: Incorporate role-plays, simulations, and group
discussions to enhance engagement.
• Schedule Sessions: Plan and schedule training sessions to accommodate staff
availability.
Implement • Facilitators: Identify and train internal or external facilitators who are
Training knowledgeable and effective.
• Delivery Methods: Use a blend of in-person training, online courses, and self-
paced learning to cater to different learning styles.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 84
Phases Steps
• Feedback Mechanisms: Collect feedback from participants to gauge the
effectiveness of the training and identify areas for improvement.
Monitor and • Assessment Tools: Use quizzes, practical exercises, and evaluations to
Evaluate measure learning outcomes and retention.
• Continuous Improvement: Regularly update training materials and methods
based on feedback, new developments, and emerging needs.
• Ongoing Support: Provide resources for ongoing learning and support, such as
Support and mentorship programs or access to a knowledge base.
Follow-Up • Refresher Courses: Schedule periodic refresher courses to reinforce learning
and update staff on new practices or policies.
• Record Keeping: Maintain records of training attendance, completion, and
Documentation evaluations.
and Reporting • Reporting: Generate reports on training outcomes, staff progress, and overall
program effectiveness for department leadership.
By following these steps, DHS can create a comprehensive and effective internal training program
that enhances its capabilities and improves the quality of services provided to clients as well as
citizen experience. Additionally, DHS should work collaboratively with OPM and consider adapting
the culture of learning concept by:
• Adopting an organizational shift in how training and learning are approached and delivered
• Allowing learning to become part of a larger framework of their business systems and
professional development
• Communicating this approach to staff to send a positive message that their work, job
performance, and success is supported by the organization
• Developing the learning processes to align with DHS goals
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – ADE Work Plan - provides the action steps in
the recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with DHS staff and review
of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Culture: Promote a Learning Culture
• Encourage Participation: Foster a culture that values continuous learning and professional
development.
• Recognition: Recognize and reward employees who excel in their training and apply their
learning effectively.
• TSS OPM and DHS should convene a workgroup that includes HR leads for other departments
to identify core modules, establish consistent and standardized training applicable across
all departments (e.g., DFA-University or DFA-U).50
50
See Arkansas Forward DFA-3 (DFA-U is a department-wide leadership program designed to identify
employees within the department that demonstrate the characteristics and desire to be future leaders within
DFA),
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 85
Other states have successfully offered state-wide, multi-stage leadership training to help identify,
develop, and retain public sector employees.
Texas HHSC Leadership Program
Figure 27 outlines a best practice from the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC),
which has developed a leadership program consisting of four modules, two programs and two
“academies” to serve four departments. Through this leadership program, HHSC has reached 53,000
employees of HHSC. The program has existed for 12 years, with a retention rate of ~70% for all
employees who have completed the program and an advancement rate of ~50%. HHSC program staff
indicate that the rewards of their program are that the programs are highly visible, help further growth,
and participants are able to network with agency employee with whom they would otherwise never
work. Graduates receive certificates as well as training hours.
Figure 27 – Best Practice: Texas Health and Human Services Commission
Program Program Features
• Meant for high performing individuals, not managers or supervisors,
that want to grow within their own skill set and within agency.
• Four months in duration and it is 100% virtual.
• Program consists of four sessions and then a graduation ceremony.
The sessions are 1.5-2 days.
• The purpose of ECP is for the employees to “Own Their Influence.”
They are taught that leadership is influence and they leave with the
understanding that they take ownership of that principle.
• Participants are paired up with a “Transitional Mentor” – a front-line
Extraordinary Contributors
manager that has made the transition to manager in the last two
Program (ECP) years. The Transitional Mentor is supposed to connect with the
mentee on at least 4 sessions outside the program sessions.
• Participants are asked to do projects and come up with
recommendations, for example: how do you make meetings
meaningful?
• This program offers an opportunity to serve as coach; participants
get a book called “Active Coaching” and receive a ½ day or full day
of coaching.
• The program puts participants in groups of six, which helps develop
an bond with five peers.
• Participants are high performing individuals who want to move into
management or supervision.
• Program assesses whether employees are equipped to make the
shift mentally and emotionally to leadership roles: are employees
individual contributions to a team or someone who can lead a
team?
Aspiring Leaders Program • Focus on the different mental and emotional skill set needed to
(ALP) supervise people.
• Objective for program is clarity – do they really want to supervise
people?
• The program is 4 months in duration; with 1.5 day sessions
occurring approximately every 3 weeks.
• The program offers a hybrid option of in-person or Zoom
participation.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 86
Program Program Features
• The academy is for those new to the management and the
leadership ladder.
Rising Leaders Academy (RLA) • Attendees are taught from book “The Five Dysfunctions of the
Team” by Patrick Lencioni.
• This academy includes in-depth leadership learning.
• A 360 Self-Assessment is required for each participant.
• The Executive Leadership academy is for senior leaders, senior
managers and directors, to help prepare for executive leadership.
Executive Leadership • Unlike other leadership programs, for this academy, the head of the
Academy agency must approve a candidate’s attendance.
• A 360 Self-Assessment is required and candidates must also
complete a leadership development plan.
• Attendees are assigned a mentor.
Source: Interview with Texas Health and Human Services Commission official.
For the ECP and ALP programs, participants complete an application, which a manager has to
approve. Applications are based on a first come, first-served basis. Program cohorts are limited to 36
participants for these programs. For the Academies, seats are selected by the executives in the
agency. Academies meet for a total of six months. For all the programs, there is homework and
prework, and for ELA, participants must come back to give a 15-minute presentation after they have
completed the program.
HHSC reviews their leadership program every two years. Evaluations by participants are based on
three principles: was the content relevant, reliable and applicable. Program staff at HHSC stressed
that important factors of the program’s success are: 1. That they do not spend time on agency
information and do not have directors or bureau heads come in to give talks; 2. They do not use a
traditional classroom; 3. They do not use the words “training” or “curriculum” or “info dump” - their
programs instead aim to be “fluid and organic” and focused on applicable tools that are relevant to
being applied now. For graduates of their programs, there is an Alumni Association, which enables
graduates to continue their leadership development. Alumni have access to an alumni list serve and
there is also a newsletter that is sent out to graduates.
Recommended steps for deploying DHS training program (future state):
Professional Development Recommendations – Management
• Create leadership development programs for high performing staff within DHS (emerging
leaders) that desire to move into supervisory and management roles.
• Offer ongoing professional development and not just DHS Supervisor training.
• The learning organization model must be applied across the entire organization.
• Promote informal opportunities and forums for supervisors to share innovative methods,
practices, and brainstorm new ideas.
• Prepare senior leaders to identify “up and coming” leaders.
Professional Development Recommendations – Senior Leadership
DHS could differentiate themselves from other state organizations by fostering a culture of learning
and developing senior managers to be thought leaders. Ongoing professional development
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 87
opportunities can take the shape of many formal and informal programs, courses, certificates, and
internal learning instruction, as demonstrated by the Texas HHSC best practice example.
Senior leaders need to evaluate strategic options with thoughtful and dialectic executive decision
making. Leaders need to be inclusive and at other times, be decisive. They have to manage,
influence, and lead change, have the capability to build teams, coach and develop others, all while
achieving desired and measurable results. This is only a sample of leadership characteristics and
skills. The list of desired leadership attributes is overwhelming and often causes an organization to
become myopic and only focus on a few. Recommendations for a multi-tiered approach for ongoing
senior leadership professional development, could include;
• First and foremost, shift from an organization that trains it staff and leaders, to an
organization that fosters, promotes, and supports learning at all levels.
• Executive coaching and consulting by professionals with senior leadership experience to
include external expertise in leadership development. There are a plethora of options
available for DHS to consider.
• Most major universities and the Ivy League schools offer leadership certificate programs that
can be completed online or with instructor-led options. Additional subject matter
certification programs also exist through national associations including for Medicaid
finance, child welfare, and other fields.
• Develop an internal leadership academy led by TSS and DHS executive level leaders. The
academy should assign and rotate mentors to small groups of emerging leaders. Each
mentor would focus on a specified topic and include experiential learning with business case
reviews/discussions and projects to advance leadership skill development.
• Encourage formal and informal opportunities and forums for senior leaders to constantly
share innovative methods, practices, and brainstorm new ideas.
• Involve institutions of higher learning by developing partnerships with Arkansas’s universities
that have management and public policy programs.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative assumes DHS
would create a team focused on leadership development. The experience of other states suggests
having dedicated staff support is important to sustain leadership development programs over time.
Based on interviews with DHS leadership, DHS would need to collaborate with OPM to obtain
approval if there is a need to reclassify positions to form this team.
Estimation of department priorities with staffing and resources: Based on DHS initial sizing
of costs, leadership expects that the initiative can be accomplished through existing appropriations.
Cost savings and cost avoidance opportunities (such as from reduced turnover) could be captured
in the future but are indeterminable at this time.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: Training
and development of staff can help employees learn or strengthen skills and increase confidence,
motivation, and productivity. Leadership programs and mentoring create community. Best practice
adoption builds credibility. To retain skilled employees and develop future leaders, it is critical to
understand employee career objectives and align them with organizational goals. This initiative
enables employees to gain new skills and feel engaged with peers, management, and DHS. By
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 88
encouraging a learning culture, DHS ensures that employees take an active role in spreading
knowledge and best practices throughout their organization. These factors can lead to happier and
engaged employees, and better employee retention for a stronger, more effective organization.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: Proposed metrics to
assess the impact of this initiative include:
• Number of employees participating in programs
• Number/percent of participants earning promotions
• Tenure (in years) of employees participating in programs
• Satisfaction rate/net promoter score with trainings
• Employee satisfaction and engagement overall
• Turnover rate at organization
In addition to these more tangible measures, there are other benefits from a more tenure and
trained workforce, which may be more challenging to quantify including:
• Measurable increase in key skills
• Measurable skills progression
• Effective delivery of public services
• Adherence to regulations
• Organizational efficiency
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: Departments gain an advantage when employees have the proper skills and training
to excel in their roles. Efficiently trained employees require less oversight, make less costly mistakes,
and are better at problem solving than employees who have not been properly trained. Additionally,
there are reduced costs related to employee retention and satisfaction.
Change Management Plan: Clear communication with staff about the purpose for the changes
should accompany any information on the new process changes. Recommended messaging and
modalities are included for each audience in Figure 28. Key activities and timing for communication
plan are included in Appendix A – DHS Work Plan.
Figure 28 – DHS-3 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
All Staff • DHS is embarking on a plan to develop Staff Email HR Director
career paths through specialized training Division
and leadership training as well as the Directors
development of a mentoring program. Leadership
• This will support employee development
and improve customer experience.
• This investment will help DHS better fulfill
its mission.
All Staff • DHS specialized training subject matter Staff Email HR Director
areas Staff Bulletins
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 89
• DHS Mentoring program opportunities Staff Announcements Division
Staff Meetings Directors
Leadership
Emerging • DHS Leadership training opportunities Staff Email HR Director
Leaders Staff Announcements Division
Staff Meetings Directors
Leadership
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 90
Initiative DHS #10 - Streamline Medicaid eligibility and enrollment for maternity care
This initiative seeks to streamline the eligibility and enrollment processes for the maternal health
prevention program by increasing enrollment for pregnant and new moms.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Expectant mothers can become eligible to gain access
to prenatal care and services in Arkansas under the following scenarios:
Traditional Medicaid: An expectant mother who is 17% or below of the Federal Poverty Level (FPL),
the expectant mother can become eligible for coverage for these Medicaid prenatal services under
the traditional Medicaid program and will remain on Medicaid while she meets that income threshold
for eligibility.
Pregnancy Medicaid: If the expectant mother is between 18% - 208% FPL, the expectant mother can
be covered for the same prenatal services under the Pregnancy Medicaid program. That program is
also designed to support expectant mothers who may not have the financial means to cover the
costs associated with prenatal care, labor, and delivery. Medicaid coverage under Pregnancy
Medicaid in Arkansas will continue for the mother post-delivery of the child up to 60 days after
delivery. Pregnancy Medicaid is a powerful tool, empowering expectant mothers to take charge of
their health and well-being. By offering financial assistance and comprehensive coverage, the
program ensures that no woman is left without access to crucial prenatal care services.
ARHome Waiver: DHS also oversees the ARHome Waiver program that offers Medicaid Waiver
services for beneficiaries who are eligible and at the FPL above traditional Medicaid and up to 138%
of the FPL. The ARHome Waiver also covers prenatal and postnatal care and services for expectant
and new mothers and coverage would continue while the mother remains eligible for the Waiver
services.
The pre-natal services under each of these programs include check-ups, screenings, and diagnostic
tests and they are needed to keep an eye on the health of both the mother and the growing baby.
Additionally, access to pre- and post-natal services for expectant and new mothers in Arkansas is
available on the Federal Health Exchange with little to no premiums for those outside of these poverty
limits up to 400% of the FPL.
There are current issues and gaps in service that this initiative seeks to address, including:
• Identifying expectant mothers who meet the income thresholds for these Medicaid services.
• Educating expectant mothers who are not currently eligible about the availability of these
Medicaid programs and services.
• Streamlining the eligibility process for expectant mothers in their communities so that they
can become eligible without any interruptions in important and timely care.
• Ensuring there are no gaps in coverage where an expectant mother, who was previously
covered by Medicaid received a renewal request and allowed their Medicaid coverage to
lapse for reasons other than ineligibility (no longer living at same address/never received the
Notice/barriers to renew or the county offices/or other reasons).
• Assisting with any transitions to post-natal services that are available so that there is no gap
in coverage after the 60-day period for new moms that have given birth that are covered by
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 91
Pregnancy Medicaid. These new mothers can transition to traditional Medicaid or the
ARHome Waiver, assuming income eligibility, or can be assisted to move to coverage under
the Federal exchange.
Rationale: Arkansas had the highest known rate of maternal mortality in the U.S. from 2018 to
2021, according to the CDC. Moreover, more than 43 mothers out of every 100,000 live births died
during that span. The overall rate in Arkansas increased from 12.2 to nearly 29 between 1999 and
2019. 51
Prenatal care should begin as soon as a woman knows or thinks she is pregnant. Early and regular
prenatal visits are important for the health of both the mother and the fetus. Research shows that
prenatal care makes a difference for a healthy pregnancy. Women who do not seek prenatal care are
three times as likely to deliver a low-birth-weight infant. Lack of prenatal care can also increase the
risk of infant death. 52 Arkansas sees roughly 35,000 births per year, but about 10,000 pregnant
Arkansans do not seek medical care until after their first trimester and 1,100 do not see a doctor until
they are giving birth, 53 and Medicaid pays for over 19,000 of these births a year, more than half of the
births in the entire state.
As a consequence, in March of 2024, the Arkansas Governor issued Executive Order 24-03 to
“Support Moms, Protect Babies, and Improve Maternal Health.” 54 The Executive Order creates an
Arkansas Strategic Committee for Maternal Health to work with lawmakers, health care providers
and advocacy groups to develop a statewide maternal health plan. The plan is to develop strategies
that will jumpstart education on existing prenatal and postpartum health care availability, increase
service access and improve statewide data coordination.
The order also includes a list of directives for DHS and the Department of Health (DOH) to
“immediately enroll people in available health coverage, develop an ad campaign and look for ways
to expand telehealth, home visiting and doulas.” It also creates a Workgroup consisting of DHS, DOH,
and the Department of Education and key stakeholders, including legislators.
The Workgroup has started its work and is broken up into the four following Subcommittees:
• Medicaid Coverage and Access
• Clinical
• Education and Outreach
51
Axios NW Arkansas, “Arkansas Governor Sanders creates committee focused on state's maternal health,”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/other/arkansas-governor-sanders-creates-committee-focused-on-
states-maternal-health/ar-BB1jubaP.
52
Office on Women’s Health, “Publications: Prenatal care fact sheet,” March 6, 2009, Retrieved April 12, 2012,
http://www.womenshealth.gov/publications/our-publications/fact-sheet/prenatal-care.html.
53
Arkansas Advocate, “Arkansas governor authorizes committee, strategic plan aimed at bolstering maternal
health,” https://arkansasadvocate.com/2024/03/06/arkansas-governor-authorizes-committee-strategic-plan-
aimed-at-bolstering-maternal-
health/#:~:text=The%20state%20sees%20roughly%2035%2C000%20births%20per%20year%2C,doctor%20
until%20they%20are%20giving%20birth%2C%20Sanders%20said.
54
Office of Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders, “Sanders Signs Executive Order to Support Moms, Protect
Babies, and Improve Maternal Health,” https://governor.arkansas.gov/news_post/sanders-signs-executive-
order-to-support-moms-protect-babies-and-improve-maternal-health/.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 92
• Data and reporting
The Workgroup’s Strategic Plan, post the Subcommittee’s recommendations, is due to the Governor
in late Fall 2024.
Implementation Considerations: DHS has chosen to include this initiative in Arkansas Forward
in anticipation that it will be included in the Governor’s Workgroup recommendations to streamline
Medicaid eligibility and enrollment for maternity care. There are opportunities to close the gaps
identified above and increase the number of expecting moms in Arkansas that obtain available
prenatal Medicaid coverage as soon as they learn about their pregnancy.
Increased outreach and education in the communities through pediatricians, primary care
physicians, Federally Qualified Health Centers, other providers and community-based partners,
schools and other avenues available in the community will be important to identify potentially
eligible beneficiaries or individuals who qualify for the Exchange.
Two of the key areas that were identified by DHS include a strategy for the implementation of
Presumptive Eligibility (PE), which would require a change in the Medicaid State Plan. This initiative
would allow for a pregnant woman to become presumptively eligible for Medicaid pre-natal services.
PE determinations fast track the time it takes for pregnant individuals to receive certain pregnancy-
related Medicaid services and access the healthcare they need as early in pregnancy as possible,
while waiting for the full Medicaid eligibility process to be completed. This could expedite the
process for especially those expectant mothers that were previously eligible but failed to renew for
reasons other than non-eligibility.
Next is an effort to work with providers in identify ways in which rates can be adjusted to incentivize
more primary care providers to be willing to provide the prenatal care needed and accept the
Medicaid rate. There are issues providers have with the current global payment system, where
payment is made to the provider as long as there is a prenatal visit and two post-partum visits.
Without that providers do not receive the global payment. An alternative payment arrangement is
being looked at that would create more of an incentive for providers to agree to participate in the
Medicaid program.
Finally, DHS needs to focus efforts on the post-partum transition after the 60-day coverage limit for
many of these new moms that continue to qualify for post-natal services in another Medicaid
program (Traditional or ARHome) or need help with transitioning to one of the Silver plans on the
Exchange that have little to no co-pay for post-natal coverage. This is in the State’s interest, because
many of these new first time moms will give birth again. There are also many available home visiting
programs that DHS is well coordinated with that can be a big help in ensuring a warm transfer to
continued eligibility for these important services.
One of the areas noted by DHS in streamlining and otherwise improving eligibility for pre-natal care
is to also address some of the barriers to access to pre-natal care, including the need for and
availability of childcare, transportation, the inability to see providers, and lack of trust in system,
especially where there may be involvement with the division of children and families. The further a
woman travels to receive maternity care, the greater the risk of maternal morbidity and adverse infant
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 93
outcomes, such as stillbirth and NICU admission.55 Furthermore, longer travel distances to care can
cause financial strain on families and increased prenatal stress and anxiety. 56 The distance a woman
must travel to access care becomes a critical factor during pregnancy, at the time of birth, and in the
case of emergencies. Nationwide closures of birthing hospitals have contributed to increased
distance and travel time to care, especially in rural areas.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Work collaboratively with ADH on already available federal maternal health HRSA funded
programs to align efforts and maximize the available resources geared toward promoting
greater access to maternal health programs.
• Develop relationships with key stakeholders in the primary care provider community, and
together discuss a rate structure that would serve to incentivize participation and access.
• Use mapping to identify maternal health deserts and apply additional resources to help
remove barriers to care.
• Educate additional key stakeholders from the community, for example, mandatory reporters
in the schools and educators, to be champions about prenatal care and Medicaid eligibility.
• Work within the Life 360 program with hospital providers to utilize the Parents as Teachers
program to increase knowledge and access to maternal health services.
• Review for any Medicaid Management Information System (MMIS) updates that may be
implemented to allow for claims data to be used for early indicators once DHS learns of a
pregnancy, including indicators that can be sent to DCO staff where renewals of eligibility
occur within the pregnancy.
• Identify current resources across DHS divisions that can focus on maternal health access
and align on-going efforts with the Department of Health.
• Work with CMS on Presumptive Eligibility to ensure Medicaid State Plan changes that are
efficient and accountable changes in the eligibility and enrollment process and meets the
goals of this specific focused area of streamlining. DHS may need to conduct further analysis
and a needs assessment to ensure the SPA appropriately meets the specific needs in a
timely manner and does not create any unintended consequences.
• Ensure alignment with new eligibility and enrolment processes and the broader changes
coming from the Governor’s Strategic Committee for Maternal Health and the Workgroup
recommendations. Early and ongoing engagement with the subcommittees is important and
DHS leadership is heavily involved in coordinating this entire effort to meet the Governor’s
intent.
Other state examples of maternal health coordination are instructive for DHS.
55
Roa L, Uribe-Leitz T, Fallah PN, et al., “Travel Time to Access Obstetric and Neonatal Care in the United
States,” Obstetrics and Gynecology, 2020;136(3):610-612. doi:10.1097/AOG.0000000000004053 5 Minion
SC, Krans EE, Brooks MM, Mendez DD, Haggerty CL. Association of Driving Distance to Maternity Hospitals
and Maternal and Perinatal Outcomes. Obstetrics and Gynecology. 2022;140(5):812-819.
doi:10.1097/AOG.0000000000004960.
56
Kozhimannil KB, Hung P, Henning-Smith C, Casey MM, Prasad S. Association Between Loss of Hospital-
Based Obstetric Services and Birth Outcomes in Rural Counties in the United States, Journal of the American
Medical Association, 2018;319(12):1239. doi:10.1001/JAMA.2018.1830.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 94
Nebraska
Nebraska Medicaid has presumptive eligibility (PE) determinations to fast track the time it takes for
pregnant individuals to receive pregnancy-related Medicaid services and access the healthcare they
need as early in pregnancy as possible. A pregnant individual may qualify for presumptive Medicaid
coverage if they meet the following requirements:
• Are a U.S. citizen, U.S. national, or an eligible non-citizen;
• Their income is below the standard for their group;
• They are not currently enrolled in Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program
(CHIP); and,
• They are currently pregnant.
PE is based on information provided by the pregnant individual to the provider and no verification of
their information is required. The process includes:
• The provider confirms that the pregnant individual is not currently on Medicaid.
• The provider completes a simplified standard form with the pregnant individual.
• Information on citizenship, Nebraska residency, income, and household composition is
noted on the form.
• Once the PE provider determines that the pregnant individual is eligible for presumptive
Medicaid coverage, the standard form is completed.
• The pregnant individual then signs the form to confirm that the information listed is correct.
• The PE provider must submit the form within five business days to Nebraska Medicaid.
• The pregnant individual must also complete an application for Medicaid coverage within 60
days and the can do this online or submit it by:
o Email
o Fax
o Over the Phone
o Coming into any one of local DHHS offices and complete the and complete an
application with a Social Service Worker.
• Hospital providers are required to assist individuals in completing and submitting a Medicaid
application.
Presumptive Medicaid Coverage Benefits
PE covers only ambulatory prenatal care that is provided in the outpatient setting. PE does not cover:
• Inpatient hospital services related to pregnancy;
• Nursing home services;
• Labor and Delivery; and/or,
• The removal of an embryo/fetus from the mother, or services following such a procedure.
Duration of Presumptive Medicaid Coverage
If the pregnant individual does not complete, and submit, an application for Nebraska Medicaid
coverage, PE coverage will end on the last day of the month following the initial month in which PE
coverage was first approved. For example, if PE is approved on 3/22/24 and no application is
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 95
received, PE coverage will end on the last day of April (4/30/24). Thus, it is very important that the
pregnant individual completes and submits an application for Medicaid so that they can access full
Medicaid benefits if they are determined eligible, and this is an area that Nebraska Medicaid offers
assistance and numerous paths. 57
Mississippi
In Mississippi, recent legislative action allows for anyone who is pregnant and makes at or below
194% of the federal poverty level to qualify for Medicaid and for presumptive eligibility. These
individuals can start receiving care as soon as they find out they are pregnant by showing proof of
monthly income to staff at a qualifying location.
Pregnancy presumptive eligibility in Mississippi is still not in effect, however, despite becoming law
July 1, 2024. However, the Division of Medicaid said it has cleared several administrative hurdles and
is awaiting action from the federal government. But a discrepancy between state and federal law
may delay the process further. Legislators wrote in the bill that pregnant women must provide proof
of income when seeking prenatal care. Federal guidelines, however, state that while the agency may
require proof of citizenship or residency, it should not “require verification of the conditions for
presumptive eligibility.”
Mapping software used to help identify areas where resources are needed to improve access
to care
The distance a woman must travel to access care becomes a critical factor during pregnancy, at the
time of birth, and in the case of emergencies. Nationwide closures of birthing hospitals have
contributed to increased distance and travel time to care, especially in rural areas. In Nebraska, 51.6
percent of counties are defined as maternity care deserts compared to 32.6 percent in the U.S. 15.9
percent of women had no birthing hospital within 30 minutes compared to 9.7 percent in the U.S. 58
Mapping software is utilized to calculate distance, in miles and minutes, under normal traffic
conditions and using real-world travel routes. The map indicates the average distance to the closest
birthing hospital throughout Nebraska. Commonly used thresholds of 30- and 60- minute driving
times were applied to measure the percent of birthing people with timely access to care. This
information can help identify areas where resources are needed to improve access to care. Overall,
in the U.S. women travel 9.7 miles to their nearest birthing hospital.
Recommended steps for establishing improved Medicaid maternal health eligibility process
(future state):
• Review all recommendations from the Governor’s Maternal Health Workgroup
Subcommittees to ensure alignment.
• Establish cadence for meeting with maternity care working group to ensure initiative
complements latest plans and priorities.
57
Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services, “Presumptive Eligibility,”
https://dhhs.ne.gov/Documents/PE%20Maternal%20Health%20Fact%20Sheet.pdf.
58
March of Dimes, “Where you Live Matters: Maternity Care in Nebraska,”
https://www.marchofdimes.org/peristats/assets/s3/reports/mcd/Maternity-Care-Report-Nebraska.pdf.
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 96
• Identify the owner and any needed members from the working group to be part of a DHS
maternal health team that can work across divisions.
• Map current eligibility and enrollment processes and identify pain points for access.
• Review any MMIS changes that could be used for claims indicators once it is learned that
someone is pregnant that can be matched with eligibility system.
• Define specific KPIs to measure success of streamlining eligibility and enrollment for
maternity care initiative, identify or create new data to measure performance, and measure
current performance.
• Conduct interviews with range of maternity care beneficiaries to understand challenges in
access and enrollment in Medicaid during pregnancy; if needed, identify key needs for
different beneficiary segments.
• Design future state processes and outcomes, if needed, specific to beneficiary segments.
• Prepare Medicaid State Plan Amendment related to PE.
• Work with CMS to ensure timely approval and acceptance.
• Obtain feedback from stakeholder community.
• Educate Workgroup participants about the PE process.
• Educate lawmakers on the PE process.
• Enhance outreach efforts, including meeting with primary care providers and identify any
needed rate structure changes.
• Design and develop new PE forms and make available through number of outlets, including
providers, doctor’s offices, website, county offices, and hospitals, among others.
• Develop information bulletin or training for DHS staff, including current eligibility staff at the
County offices.
• Implement changes to eligibility and enrollment process with provider community.
• Prepare information bulletin or other educational “one pager” on the PE process.
• Review performance against baseline KPI measurements and revise systems and processes
as needed.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative is in
alignment with one of DHS’s top priorities to enhance prevention services statewide. There also may
be a need for additional resources related to changes to the enrollment systems and additional state
general fund match rate for maternal health care claims. There are existing federal HRSA funds that
are being used in Arkansas today as part of the Department of Health’s statewide Maternal Health
plan and those resources should be reviewed to ensure maximum use of available resources.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: DHS has
indicated that the current target for a Medicaid State Plan change needed to implement Presumptive
Eligibility is January 2025, if approval is received. There will be a need for new forms and ease of
availability and access to the forms. DHS staff as well as providers will need an informational bulletin
and/or training on the new process to ensure its effective implementation.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected impact of
this initiative is to increase the number of expectant mothers and new moms qualifying for Medicaid
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 97
services through PE, increased utilization of pre- and post-natal care, and subsequent improvements
in birth outcomes and reduced maternal and child mortality. Specific measures include:
• Number of expectant mothers qualifying for services through PE
• Increase in overall Medicaid enrollment for expectant mothers and new moms
• Increase in expectant mothers and new mothers receiving pre-natal and post-natal care
services
• Reduced incidence of low birth-weight Medicaid births
• Reduced incidence of pre-term birth Medicaid births
• Reduced incidence of maternal and infant mortality
• Reduced enrollment time
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: This initiative will enhance provision of prevention services and is expected to result
in future Medicaid cost savings/cost avoidance due to reductions in risk and complications related
to provision of more pre-natal and post-natal care. However, those savings are indeterminable, and
DHS did not choose to identify any specific savings attributed to this initiative.
Change Management Plan: Development of PE policies, changes to eligibility process, training
for DHS staff, and outreach to providers are all critical aspects of the new PE process. Successful
stakeholder engagement and outreach to expectant and new mothers is critical for the success of
this initiative. Additionally, key activities and timing for communication plan are included in
Appendix A – Work Plan and summarized below in Figure 29.
Figure 29 – DHS-10 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
DHS Divisional staff, • DHS is • Staff meetings • Elizabeth
including County eligibility implementing PE • Staff emails Pitman
workers to increase • Mary Franklin
provision of • Cross-
maternal health department
services Teams
• Arkansas stands • Arkansas
to benefit from Strategic
the availability of Committee for
these services in Maternal
terms of improved Health
Medicaid birth
outcomes and
provision of cost-
effective
preventive care
• Details of
program
implementation
and timing
[include]
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 98
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• Training will be
available to
support this new
program
Providers including: • Early pre-natal • Press release • Elizabeth
• Primary Care care significantly • DHS Website Pitman
providers reduces the risk • Stakeholder email lists • Mary Franklin
• Obstetricians of low birth weight • Physical materials • Cross-
• Hospitals and other distributed in provider department
• Community based potential offices Teams
organizations complications (Obstetrician/Primary • Arkansas
• Department of Health • Medicaid care offices, Hospitals) Strategic
• Department of eligibility process Committee for
Education and local will be Maternal
schools streamlined to Health
ensure timely
access
• Critical pre-natal
and post-natal
coverage already
exists for most
low income
expectant
mothers and
mothers who give
birth, especially
first time moms
• Mothers who
make up to 214%
above the federal
poverty line are
eligible for
benefits and that
care is available
at 70 health units
around the state
with "zero out-of-
pocket expenses."
• Many existing
Home Visitation
programs already
exist in the
communities to
serve expectant
and new mothers
• Process for
application for
benefits
CMS • Details of • Medicaid State Plan • Elizabeth
Arkansas’ plan to change Pitman
implement PE • Mary Franklin
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 99
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• Cross-
department
Teams
• Arkansas
Strategic
Committee for
Maternal
Health
DHS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 100
Strategic Management Plan:
Arkansas Department of Inspector General
Overview
Arkansas Department of Inspector General (DIG)’s mission is to promote accountability, integrity and
efficiency in government through independent analysis and appraisal. Created by the Arkansas
Transformation and Efficiencies Act of 2019, DIG houses four primary functions: 1) Office of Internal
Audit (OIA), 2) Office of Medicaid Inspector General (OMIG); 3) Fair Housing Commission, and 4) Tax
Appeals Commission. Two divisions are focused on prevention and detection of fraud and abuse and
government efficiency:
• OIA seeks to earn and preserve the trust of Arkansans by promoting accountability, integrity,
and efficiency in the operation of the executive branch of Arkansas government. OIA
conducts audits and investigations for cabinet-level departments (non-Medicaid), including
many that are statutorily required. All work performed by OIA is conducted in accordance
with the International Standards for the Professional Practice of Internal Auditing.
• OMIG strives to prevent, detect, and investigate fraud, waste, and abuse within the medical
assistance program (Medicaid), with a focus on provider fraud, waste, and abuse. OMIG
works closely with providers and the Department of Human Services (DHS) to prevent fraud,
waste, and abuse and refers suspected beneficiary fraud to DHS for investigation.
Through the Arkansas Forward project, a 2024 initiative to improve the efficiency and effectiveness
of Arkansas’ 15 cabinet-level departments, DIG realigned its organizational structure to strengthen
its ability to perform core roles and responsibilities, and prioritized implementation of two initiatives
to enhance fraud and abuse prevention and detection through elevated investigation quality and
outcomes.
This Strategic Management Plan (“Plan”) memorializes the work completed by DIG during Arkansas
Forward, translating the department’s vision into a plan consisting of recommended organizational
structure, key initiatives prioritized for immediate implementation, and related performance metrics.
A companion project plan (“Work Plan”) provides a more detailed resource to support
implementation of the initiatives by DIG’s Arkansas Forward project management team.
Recommended Organizational Structure
In late 2023, Secretary Allison Waldrip Bragg and DIG’s leadership team made the following changes
to align the organization’s structure with the department’s core roles and responsibilities,
governance, and performance measure goals:
• Implemented a plan to reorganize and restructure positions in the department, including a
consideration of appropriate spans of control and organizational layers
• Executed a reduction in force resulting in the termination of 5 employees.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 1
• The total cost savings recognized from the reorganization and the reduction in force was
about $317,278, including about $193,330 in general revenue savings.
These efforts have culminated in the current organization structure shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1 – Current Organizational Structure
As part of Arkansas Forward, DIG’s structure was reviewed to identify opportunities for redesign in
three areas:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission;
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives; and,
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions (i.e.,
information technology, human resources, procurement).
Recommendations based on department interviews and data analysis are included in Figure 2:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission: Given its
independence and existing statutory authority, it has been recommended to that the
ombudsman functions currently housed at the Department of Human Services (DHS) and
Public Defenders office be consolidated at DIG. DHS maintains multiple ombudsman
functions: 1) Provider-Led Arkansas Shared Saving Entity (PASSE) program that works to
protect older adults’ health, safety, welfare, and rights by resolving problems and promoting
better consumer protection at the facility, local state and national level; 2) Child welfare
ombudsman division housed within the Arkansas Commission on Child Abuse, Rape and
Domestic Violence at the University of Arkansas Medical Sciences; and 3) Juvenile
Ombudsman located at the Arkansas Public Defender Commission that provides important
independent oversight and make certain the health, safety and welfare of all vulnerable
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 2
Arkansas youth receiving juvenile services are not compromised. To maximize funding,
coordinate, and align these important services, DHS believes citizens would be better served
through consolidation of all Ombudsman offices at DIG.
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives: Given the
recent reorganization and reduction in force just completed in December 2023 no further
redesign is recommended at this juncture. There is an opportunity to focus staff on additional
use of data analytics (related to DIG Initiative #2) but to do so within existing resources
(through repurposing of available vacant positions). As the use of data analytics increases to
identify potential fraud, waste, and abuse, this could generate the need for additional
investigators, necessitating additional changes to the department’s organization structure.
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions:
Based on direction from the Steering Committee, Transformation and Shared Services (TSS)
will assume responsibility for the Payroll and Help Desk functions statewide, as the first
Human Resources and Information Technology functions to transfer to TSS in a statewide
shared services model. Additional decisions on sequencing of further functions have not yet
been determined.
Figure 2 – Recommended Organizational Structure
Note: Chart does not reflect transfer of ombudsman positions.
Meeting the Vision of an Effective and Efficient Future Department:
DIG previously implemented organizational changes to support effective and efficient delivery of its
mission. The Arkansas Forward initiatives focus on DIG resource allocation and processes and are
within the Department’s purview to address. Significant change management is not anticipated. DIG
may wish consult the other states identified in this report to support implementation of these
initiatives.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 3
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation
DIG leadership generated several ideas to improve the departmental effectiveness and efficiency,
before prioritizing two initiatives focused on its audit and investigations processes for immediate
implementation.
Initiative 1: Develop and implement a triage process to improve investigation quality,
outcomes, and recoveries
This initiative seeks to develop and implement a triage process for sourcing and selecting cases to
investigate to improve the quality and outcomes of investigations and result in higher recoveries,
when appropriate. Applicable audits and investigations include:
1) Non-Medicaid programs (examples such as child support and taxation investigations, audits,
consultation engagements, as well as non-audit projects), conducted by OIA; and,
2) Medicaid provider matters, which are conducted by OMIG. 1
Initiative Overview and Current State: Ensuring appropriate use of state funds through prevention,
detection, and investigation of fraud and abuse across government programs is central to DIG’s
mission. Audits and investigations performed by OIA and OMIG are effective mechanisms to identify
recoveries for the State of Arkansas and deter future fraud and abuse. Figure 3 provides the number
of audit and investigations performed by OIA and OMIG and Figure 4 summarizes funds recovered
due to these activities.
Figure 3 – Internal Audit and OMIG Audit and Investigations Summary, 2020 – 2023
2020 2021 2022 2023
OMIG # Fraud Investigations Opened 64 93 160 102
Total Audits and Audit Activities 866 481 1,598 581
Audit Activities excluding provider recoupment and 601 351 368 421
awareness letters
Referrals to Attorney General Medicaid Fraud 12 25 20 27
Control Office
OIA Investigations 4 93* 1 2
Audits 2 9* 5* 4
Consultations 1 0 0 1
Non-Audit 4 1 3 6
CSA 2,360 72 1,040 98
Hours Hours Hours Hours
Note*: COVID-19 CARES Act funding audits are included in FY2021 (nine) and FY2022 (four). In addition, there
were 91 complaints that were received from the Department of Human Services regarding COVID-19 Direct
Care Payments that OIA investigated in FY2021. Finally, OIA is responsible for administering the Control Self-
Assessment biennially for executive branch and participating departments; therefore, those hours have been
included. Source: OIA data request and OMIG Annual Reports, 2020-2023.
Figure 4 – Summary of OMIG Funds Recovered, 2020-2023
2020 2021 2022 2023
1
Suspected Medicaid beneficiary fraud cases are referred to the Department of Human Services.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 4
$1,966,660.59 $381,560.42 $8,712,324.67 $1,404,683.95
Source: OMIG Annual Reports, 2020-2023.
Through work sessions with division staff and leadership, three key tools were created for the OIA
and OMIG triage processes: 1) a Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs and Customers (SIPOC)
diagram to capture key information about the intake/triage process, 2) a Strategic Compass to
identify the goal of the triage process and high-level implementation steps, and 3) a more detailed
current state process map.
OIA Findings: The three diagrams are shown in Figures 5-7 and key findings include:
• OIA receives leads for audits and investigations (referrals) from multiple sources including
referrals from other cabinet-level departments (for areas such as child support and taxation)
and statutory requirements. Today, a significant portion of OIA’s resources is expended to
fulfill statutorily required audits.
• Leadership reviews and assigns staff resources to each referral that meet certain criteria for
immediate investigation. Leadership considers a high-level prioritization including whether
the issue is politically sensitive, as well as the severity, financial impact, and complexity,
among other factors. However, a formal prioritization process and related tool are not
utilized.
• Because of the team’s staffing level, nearly all non-Medicaid audits and investigations can be
initiated immediately. OIA has 9 appropriated positions with 6 positions currently filled. Of
the 6 filled positions, 2.5 FTEs are dedicated to work being performed in accordance with Act
671 of 2021. OIA audit positions complete both audits and investigations.
• OIA’s audits and investigations vary depending on the nature of the audit and investigation’s
scope of work. This prevents an established performance measure for completion timelines
to be established. It is an OIA internal best practice that a report is issued within 30 days after
completion of the fieldwork.
Figure 5 – OIA Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, and Customers Diagram
Suppliers Inputs Processes Outputs Customers
• Audit • Receive • Prioritized lists • Internal Audit
• Audit Sources
Engagement request/report of engagements Office
• Auditee
• Records from • Background • Measured • Arkansans
Leadership
requests Research “Build results • Agencies
• DIG
• Auditee File” • Improved OOO • Auditees
Leadership
cooperation • Initial knowledge for • Legislature
• Audit Scope
• Prioritization prioritization future triage
Order of • Internal priority
Operations discussion
(OOO) • Place in Audit
• Considerations: schedule based
• Governor on priority
• Political
• Potential
Severity/
Allegations-
Financial/
Health & Safety
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 5
Suppliers Inputs Processes Outputs Customers
• Complexity
• Publicity
• Statute
• Frequency
• Staff availability
Figure 6 – OIA Strategic Compass
Source: Developed in work session with DIG staff on 06/05/24.
Figure 7 – OIA Referral Intake and Triage Process
Source: Developed in work session with DIG staff on 06/05/24.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 6
OMIG Findings: The three diagrams are shown in Figures 8-10 and key findings include:
• Most referrals received are identified initially by an internal OMIG data analytics resource
(the percentage varies each year). Other referrals are received from OIA, the OMIG fraud
hotline, Special Investigations Units at the Provider-Led Arkansas Shared Savings Entities
(PASSEs) and external departments such as the Department of Human Services (DHS).
• OMIG has a team of 1 investigator, 5 auditors, and 6 additional staff (1 FTE for data analytics,
2 claims processors, 2 legal, and 1 program administrator); current capacity requires
prioritization of cases for investigation because the workload is greater than available
resources. OMIG’s data team reviews referrals prior to investigation or audit. Division leadership
discuss and prioritize referrals to enable the assignment of resources. As one strategy to
expand engagement of Medicaid providers without requiring staff interventions, OMIG also
implemented recoupment and provider awareness letter campaigns.
• While there are steps in the division’s process for leadership to review referrals, a formal
prioritization process and related tool are not utilized.
Figure 8 – OMIG Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, and Customers Diagram
Inputs Processes Outputs Customers
Suppliers
• Allegation: • Intake • Referral to • Provider
• QIarant-
who, what, • Vetting MCFU • Outside
contractor,
where, when, • Data pull to further • Case created agency
FWA-geared
why how? validate Optum Case • Contractor:
solutions
• Data analytics • Case tracking Tracking for Optum or
• Optum-
to identify • Preliminary review data analytics QIarant
• independent
potential • Assign as project • Referral to
state data
fraud from • Document review Auditor or
contractor
trends • Report/responsive investigator
• OMIG team
• Federal and • Recoupment/ • Recoupment
provides data
state • Appeal/Closed letter
analytics
regulations • Referral to DHS
• Anonymous (primary for beneficiary
public from the focus) issue
website/ concerning • Referral to
• calls/emails Medicaid outside agency
• DHS referrals practices
• Legislature
Source: Developed in work session with DIG staff on 06/27/24.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 7
Figure 9 – OMIG Strategic Compass
Source: Developed in work session with DIG staff on 06/27/24.
Figure 10 – OMIG Referral Intake and Triage Process
Source: Developed in work session with DIG staff on 06/27/24.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 8
Rationale: It is anticipated that the number of Medicaid and non-Medicaid audits and investigations
will continue to increase in the future as DIG better leverages available data to identify potential
fraud, waste, and abuse (see Initiative DIG-2), necessitating a more formalized process (prioritization
tool) for triaging audits and investigations in OIA and OMIG, to ensure the best use of DIG’s finite audit
and investigation resources. Based on this anticipated need, Initiative DIG-1 directs DIG to
implement a triage process which is anticipated to improve the quality and outcomes of
investigations, and ensure resources prioritize cases to maximize recoveries for the state. Other
state examples illustrating the potential of a more comprehensive triage process at DIG are shown in
Figure 11.
Figure 11 – Other State Examples: Triage
State Process Overview Triage Questions
Florida The OIG function is embedded within OIG management considers a variety of factors
Office of each state agency. Using the example when determining the best course of action for
Inspector of the Department of Health, OIG handling each non-Whistleblower complaint.
General receives complaints from multiple Examples of the criteria they consider include
sources (public, employees, (direct excerpt):
contractors, other departments). • Does each allegation suggest a potential
Complaints are logged, triaged, and violation or law, rule, and/or policy?
assigned a prioritization in their • Did the complainant(s) provide supporting
Incident Report System. Using the evidence for each allegation?
identified triage questions, each • Did the complainant(s) provide witnesses for
complaint receives a status (direct each allegation?
excerpt from tool): • What OIG staff resources and expertise will be
needed and are they available?
• No Further Action – the complaint • What is the seriousness of each allegation?
does not meet the standard for • Could additional evidence be reasonably
further review or investigative obtained by OIG staff?
action and is closed. • Is the allegation a management issue, best
• Preliminary Inquiry – the complaint handled by local management?
needs further review to determine
the course of action that will be
taken.
• External Referral – the complaint
falls under the jurisdiction of
another entity and it is referred to
that entity.
• Management Advisory or
Management Referral – the
complaint is determined to be one
of a management issue and is sent
to management for review and
action deemed appropriate.
Management may be asked to
report back to the OIG their results
and any action taken.
• Internal Investigation – the non-
whistleblower complaint will be
investigated by OIG staff.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 9
State Process Overview Triage Questions
• Whistle-blower (WB) Investigation
– the complaint will be investigated
by the OIG as a whistle-blower
investigation, subject to the
requirements of the Whistle-
blower’s Act.
Texas Office The Texas Predictive Analytic Tool is a The risk levels are based on information provided
of Inspector product developed by the Texas data by applicants about the household and other
General broker (vendor) to identify the risk level information including:
for applicant households and to • Eligibility System information entered for each
support assignment of more senior individual (name, address, Date of Birth (DOB)
staff based on case complexity. It has and Social Security Number (SSN), if
been piloted and is expected to be applicable);
used widely in the near future. Early • Information obtained from State and Federal
usage of the tool has made it possible data sources for each individual age 16 and
to identify cases as high risk that may older; and,
not have otherwise resulted in an • Additional data from sources specific to
investigation and identifying cases Predictive Analytics model.
where there is not a need to expend
more investigations resources. The information PA identifies as potentially
questionable determines the overall Risk Level
A version of this tool is being used and applies to the entire household. PA assigns
today in Ohio for Medicaid ex parte the highest Risk Level to the report.
automated renewals. The tool can
also be adapted to support the triage The Risk Levels range from lowest to highest:
process (such as to identify referrals as • No Risk
low, medium and high risk). • Low Risk
• High Risk
• Potential Fraud
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – DIG Work Plan – provides the action steps in the
recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with DIG staff and review
of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Conduct end-to-end investigations process mapping and formalize policies and procedures
for the intake, evaluation/prioritization, and audit and investigation processes (for both
Medicaid and non-Medicaid investigations). This will support completion of consistent and
efficient investigations and can serve as a training tool. Some specific process gaps to
consider include:
o How to conduct value-based audits, given their growing use in government programs.
o Formalizing mechanisms for tracking investigation outcomes to drive accountability
in achieving outcomes.
• Enhance collaboration with the Department of Human Services (DHS) by reviewing key
process steps used by both departments and maximizing collaboration in the Medicaid
investigations processes. If required, review and revise the current Memorandum of
Understanding (MOU) between the two departments to articulate the duties, task, timelines
of each department.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 10
• Establish an ongoing, defined cadence of meetings with DIG’s partner departments including
DHS and the Attorney General Medicaid Fraud Control Unit to ensure strategic alignment of
programs, review process improvement opportunities, discuss investigation findings and
mitigation strategies, and share best practices.
• Explore the feasibility of expanding DIG OIA investigator access to data to support the quality
of investigations (see Initiative DIG-2).
• Vet workflow management tools (also known as case management systems) to support DIG
divisions with real-time task management, improve collaboration, and ensure timely
completion of investigations. Divisions that may especially benefit from such a tool include
OIA and OMIG. Some organizations choose to purchase an available software as a service
solution (i.e., Salesforce, Amazon Simple Workflow) and some choose to build their own
platform. DIG should consult with TSS DIS, as it has some relevant tools immediately on
hand, as well as some that will be available in the near future with workflow features (e.g.,
ServiceNow and IBM CloudPak for Automation).
Recommended steps for establishing an improved and standardized triage process (future
state):
• Review audit and investigation outcomes to identify common factors for successful and non-
successful cases (separated by case type).
• Identify and formalize criteria for prioritization of Medicaid and non-Medicaid audits and
investigations and obtain leadership buy-in on criteria (e.g., beneficiary impact, high-risk
provider types, funding threshold).
• Review current intake form for audit and investigation referrals to DIG with a workgroup of
auditors and investigations staff to identify additional data fields for inclusion that could
provide more complete information to use in the prioritization process and subsequent
investigation. These fields should tie to the criteria identified for triage (e.g., if beneficiary
impact is one of the criteria added for the triage process, related fields for the form could
provided coded options for the referring entity to categorize the beneficiary impact (e.g.,
health and safety, improved experience, fiscal impact).
• Create a workflow for new triage process and a standard process for prioritized
investigations, with clear steps, decision points, and accountable parties (separate
processes for Medicaid and non-Medicaid audits). Note that Figures 12 and 13 provide a high
level view of the process, with the triage steps noted, but this recommendation would be to
develop the triage sub-process in greater detail.
• Pilot and refine the triage program criteria using a set of well-understood and documented
case types. Measure results of the pilot and compare outcomes against baseline
measurements to identify the impact of process changes on investigation quality and
outcomes. Because there is not a current baseline, defining and collecting initial data to
serve as a baseline will need to be addressed in the planning for this initiative.
• Implement the new triage process fully for all audits and investigations, based on pilot
results. Refine approach if pilot proves unsuccessful.
• Establish regular review of triage process to ensure continuous improvement. A risk of
developing a codified triage process is that such a process could create “blind spots” for DIG
that allow new adverse patterns to expand and grow unchecked. To mitigate this risk, DIG
should (1) conduct regular audits on leads falling out of current triage process to identify any
trends or patterns; and (2) consider revising triage criteria if patterns based on findings.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 11
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative seeks to deploy
existing staff resources efficiently; no additional staffing or re-organization of staff is required.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: This initiative
has the potential to impact OIA and OMIG for referral, intake/prioritization, and investigations
processes. Figures 12 and 13 illustrate a proposed “future state” for OIA and OMIG, respectively,
which includes implementation of more formalized and documented triage processes using a triage
tool (see new steps shaded in orange). OIA and OMIG could create a triage template or tool that can
be used to recognize opportunities for fraud, incentives for fraud, and high-risk areas using certain
indicators. The reviewer would check for the presence of certain characteristics or indicators and
aggregate the total number of indicators identified. While each indicator would be a separate event,
combining the indicators in the determination of an overall score helps to determine the opportunity
of suspicious activity. Over time, weights for the indicators can be established (e.g., certain
indicators may be more often linked with fraud, waste, and abuse) and a more sophisticated scoring
system developed. A sample of key indicators are identified in Figure 14. It is recommended that DIG
staff meet to review this list as well as other state best practices to finalize a tool, scoring, and
process for OIA and OMIG. Comprehensiveness of the tool should be balanced with limiting the
number of indicators to avoid creating a form that is too burdensome for staff to complete. This
method can be used to triage audit requests, investigation requests, grant monitoring, and/or other
transactions.
Figure 12 – Proposed “Future State” OIA Triage Process
Source: Developed in work session with DIG staff on 06/05/24.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 12
Figure 13 – Proposed “Future State” OMIG Triage Process
Source: Developed by consultant team.
Figure 14 – Sample Indicators to Consider in Developing a Triage Template
Sample Indicators for Consideration
• Is the referral from the governor, secretary, or • Are there operational inefficiencies?
legislature? • Is there a high turnover rate or key staff
• Is the potential for the issue to receive news resignations?
coverage? • Is there an opportunity for incurring unnecessary
• Is there a health or safety issue? costs?
• Are the acts not compliant with state and federal • Are there inadequate controls?
laws and regulations? • Has overtime increased?
• Are there operational inefficiencies? • Are there potential conflicts of interest?
• Are expected outcomes not being achieved? • Are there instances where there is a failure to
• Is the occurrence very likely to happen? provide required items?
• Is the occurrence more likely to occur? • Is there a lack of financial controls that could lead
• Is there a significant fiscal impact or potential to embezzlement?
fiscal impact? • Are there frequent instances where reports are
• Is there an opportunity for incurring unnecessary not submitted in a timely manner?
costs? • Is information or data subject to falsification?
• Is there an increase in claims for reimbursement? • Is there potential for the substitution of materials
or supplies?
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 13
Sample Indicators for Consideration
• Are there delays in producing documentation or • Does the vendor or contractor have safeguards in
lack of documentation? place for identifying and reporting fraud, waste
• Are appropriate signatures missing? and abuse?
• Are there handwriting discrepancies?
• Is there a high turnover rate or key staff
resignations?
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected impacts of this
initiative are to target use of audit and investigation resources efficiently on the most significant
instances of fraud and abuse based upon agreed criteria, supporting process improvement, timely
completion of audits and. investigations, and maximizing state collections. To support performance
measure development and setting of goals, DIG should establish goal turnaround times for each
priority level. Recommended performance measures include the following and should be captured
for OIA and OMIG activities:
• Average time to close an audit (by priority level, measured in days)
• Average time to close an investigation (by priority level, measured in days)
• % of high priority audits completed within X days (need to establish goal based on current
performance and goal turnaround for high priority audits)
• % of high priority investigations completed within X days (need to establish goal based on
current performance and goal turnaround for high priority audits)
• % of completed and successful investigations resulting in a referral for prosecution
• Value of collections identified (in dollars)
• $/% of collections successfully recovered
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: Based on DIG’s initial analysis and re-evaluation, Initiative DIG-1 has the potential
positive annual reoccurring financial impact of $50,000, which includes cost savings/cost avoidance
opportunities that could be captured in the future. It is anticipated that the costs of creating a triage
process can be accomplished within existing resources. If some of the ancillary recommendations
are implemented (such as adoption of a workflow management tool), there could be additional IT
costs incurred (this could range significantly if an internal tool is developed vs. purchase of a
software as a service solution). If this value is captured, it 1) may address an already agreed upon
budget target, 2) may be reinvested, and/or 3) may be harvested in a budget reduction. This initiative
could begin implementation immediately, with benefit being captured in 6 months, and according to
staff, completion of this data initiative occurring in 2026.
Change Management Plan: This initiative may include formalization of processes and
establishment of uniform processes. Clear communication with staff about the purpose for the
changes should accompany any information on the new process changes. The primary changes
contemplated in this initiative are internal to DIG and are not likely to require significant external
change management. However, DIG may wish to expand collaboration with its key partner
departments on the intake process (to improve the quality of referrals) and on its internal
prioritization process to manage partner expectations. Recommended messaging and modalities
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 14
are included for each audience in Figure 14. Key activities and timing for communication plan are
included in Appendix A – DIG Work Plan.
Figure 14 – DIG-1 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Staff within Internal • These process improvements • Town halls. • Secretary Bragg
Audit Office are about professionalizing • Emails and • Ricky Quattlebaum
processes to achieve DIG’s internal staff • Samantha
mission. memos. Blassingame
• DIG seeks to formalize • Policy
processes to ensure continued manuals.
focus on investigations with the
potential greatest impact for
Arkansans and to maximize the
state’s recoveries.
External partner • DIG asks for support in • Face-to-face • Ricky Quattlebaum
departments expanding the information meeting with • Samantha
submitted with a referral (on leadership of Blassingame
the intake form) to support a impacted
new triage process. This could departments.
require more time/effort on the • Emails for
part of external staff submitting impacted
these referrals. staff.
• This information will help DIG
triage referrals and ensure
continued focus on
investigations with the
potential greatest impact.
Initiative 2: Use data/analytics to detect financial irregularities
This initiative recommends that DIG use data/analytics to detect financial irregularities for further
investigation rather than relying primarily on referrals and complaints, to improve timeliness and
outcomes of investigations and result in higher recoveries. The scope of this initiative includes use
of data to identify investigations completed by OIA and OMIG.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Under A.C.A. § 20-77-2505, OMIG is required to “(1) Prevent,
detect, and investigate fraud and abuse within the medical assistance program; (2) Refer appropriate
cases for criminal prosecution; (3) Recover improperly expended medical assistance funds; (4) Audit
medical assistance program functions; and (5) Establish a medical assistance fraud and abuse
prevention program.” OMIG receives referrals from internal audits and data-driven analysis, the
OMIG fraud hotline, DHS, law enforcement, and Special Investigative Units of Medical Managed Care
Organizations (Dental Managed Care Organizations and Provider-Led Arkansas Shared Savings
Entities).
OMIG’s organization includes one staff resource with education and training in advanced data
analytics and access to two external vendors to support data analytics (QIarant and Optum). The
majority of OMIG’s audit and investigations workload today is generated through DIG’s own data
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 15
analytics efforts (the percentage varies from year to year but is typically half to three-fourths of the
total referrals and complaints).
Under A.C.A. § 25-43-1004, OIA’s authority is established, including that it may, but is not required to,
audit (1) executive branch entities’ financial and operating controls and transactions “to determine
the level of conformity with established laws, standards, rules, and procedures;” as well as (2)
executive branch entities’ to appraise the efficiency and economy of operations and the
effectiveness with which the functions achieve operational, reporting, and compliance objectives.
Statute does not establish all areas of purview for audits and investigations; nearly all statutory
guidance for audit activities is provided in departmental authorizing statutes.
For non-Medicaid referrals, access to data and analytics resources is limited and OIA’s investigative
functions are hindered by its lack of access. Despite the transfer of certain investigatory duties and
resources from the Department of Human Services (DHS) and the Department of Finance and
Administration (DFA) to DIG under the Arkansas Transformation and Efficiencies Act of 2019, DIG
staff have not been able to obtain direct access to many state data bases, such as the adult and child
maltreatment registry at DHS, and, in a number of cases, will have to make a specific request for
temporary access to certain applicable state data from other departments. OIG staff have identified
approximately 25 data sources that could improve the effectiveness and efficiency of investigations
including but not limited to:
• Merged claims and encounter data across fee-for-service and managed care Medicaid
programs;
• Access to additional claims data through the Arkansas Medicaid All-Payer Claims database;
and,
• Other programmatic data housed in the Department of Finance and Administration’s data
warehouse.
Rationale: Access to data resources, capabilities, and needs differ for OIA and OMIG staff, but in
both cases, significant opportunity exists to expand use of data to inform individual investigations
and enable success of systemic efforts to eradicate fraud and abuse. Initiative DIG-2 directs the
department to expand use of data/analytics in the investigation process to improve fraud
detection and the timing and quality of investigations, which could result in larger identification
of recoupments. For OMIG, expansion could involve greater dedication of resources for data
analytics; for OIA, there is an opportunity to model some of the effective practices used by OMIG if
the division can obtain access to necessary data.
At OMIG, data analytics have proven highly successful in identifying potential fraud and abuse, but
there are opportunities for expansion:
• Given limited internal analytics resources, greater resources could enable greater analysis
into additional data sets, provider types, and in building machine learning/AI or other models
to proactively.
• Enabling OMIG staff to combine data sets (e.g., FFS and managed care data, or Medicaid and
other payer data) may identify result in the proactive identification of new instances of
suspected fraud, waste, and abuse in state programs based on provider behavior in other
programs.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 16
• Use of non-traditional data sources (such as social media platforms), which may support
identification of fraud, waste, and abuse.
Collectively, these strategies support continued expansion and maturation of OMIG’s data analytics
capabilities.
At OIA, for non-Medicaid audits and investigations, there are barriers to access needed data, which
not only hinders completion of individual audits and investigations but prevents implementation of
systemic interventions proven effective by OMIG such as data mining, predictive analytics, artificial
intelligence. Other states have leveraging additional sources of data effectively to drive new
investigations and collections in non-Medicaid programs. Figure 15 outlines a best practice from the
Texas Office of Inspector General (OIG), which has continued to invest in data analytics, calling these
efforts “…one of the most effective uses of state resources, allowing investigators to identify risks
program-wide instead of relying on individual referrals to identify misuse by a single provider…” 2 In
addition, data-based monitoring of the many grant recipients in Arkansas represents an untapped
area of oversight.
Figure 15 – Best Practice: Texas Office of Inspector General
Process Overview Key Data Sources
Texas OIG is a department included in the broader State Data Sources available:
Health and Human Services Commission. As an • Texas Bureau of Vital Statistics: Marriage and
HHSC agency, OIG has access to a data broker divorce records
contract/vendor, which has been in place for 25 • Texas Office of the Attorney General: Child
years. The vendor has entered into Memoranda of support
Understanding with other state and federal entities • Texas Health and Human Services
to leverage available data at no additional state Commission Quality Control: Quality
cost except for construction of the data broker sanctions
interface to connect to these data sources. • Texas Lottery Commission: Lottery winnings
Additional commercial data sources are also • Texas Health and Human Services Lone Star
integrated into this system. Business Services: EBT Out of State Shopping
• Texas Employer New Hire Report: Employer
Outcomes: In the first three quarters of 2024 alone, New Hires
Texas OIG has recovered $342.5 million from • Texas Division of Motor Vehicles: vehicle
providers and beneficiaries. 3 This has included registration
provider/MCO recoveries and beneficiary
• Texas Workforce Commission: Quarterly
recoveries for programs including Supplemental
Wages and Unemployment
Nutrition Assistance Program; Women, Infants, and
• Texas Department of Criminal Justice:
Children; Medicaid; Temporary Assistance for
Corrections data
Needy Families; and the Children’s Health
• Texas Department of Public Safety: Driver’s
Insurance Program.
license registration
• Texas Health and Human Services Integrity
Support Services (ISS): Previous ISS findings
and potential identity theft
Federal Data Sources available:
• US Citizenship and Immigration Services
(USCIS): Citizenship and immigration data
2
Texas OIG, March 23, 2023, https://oig.hhs.texas.gov/about-us/news/data-analytics-strengthens-oig-process.
3
Texas OIG, Q3 Fiscal Year 2024 Quarterly Report.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 17
Process Overview Key Data Sources
• National Directory of New Hires (NDNH):
National new hires
• Electronic Disqualified Recipient System
(eDRS)
• Disqualified Recipients
• Federal Data Services Hub (FDSH)
Additional commercial data sources (OIG pays to
utilize this data through the data broker contract):
• Accuity
• Price Digests
• Equifax
• Lexis Nexis
• Experian
Sources: Texas OIG, Quarter 3 Fiscal Year 2024 report, Interview with state official.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – DIG Work Plan – provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with DIG staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Cross-department coordination with multiple entities will support the implementation of
these recommendations. OIA should form a workgroup with key partners like Transformation
and Shared Services Department of Information Systems (DIS), Department of Finance and
Administration among others, to support implementation of these recommendations and
establish governance for shared data. Once implementation is complete, this body could
continue meeting on a regular cadence to provide oversight.
• OIA, in collaboration with DIS and DFA, should determine the most feasible and cost-
effective approach for data sharing, based on current and future capabilities. Obtaining
access to discrete data sources or departmental data warehouses could address OIA’s
needs in the short-term, while a longer-term integrated data warehouse approach or some
other means of data sharing could be vetted. An incremental “crawl, walk, run” approach
could be developed to allow the state to begin to immediate realize value from this initiative
at low or no cost while longer-term solutions are vetted.
• OMIG’s current organization includes one primary staff resource with education and training
in advanced data analytics and access to two external vendors to support data analytics
(QIarant and Optum). OMIG may consider repurposing existing vacant positions to expand
the capacity of its internal team in a cost-neutral manner. Finally, to fully realize benefits of
models such as data mining, predictive analytics, and artificial intelligence, DIG may
consider identifying a vendor to build work with DIG staff in building these tools.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 18
In planning for the implementation of this initiative, a work session with staff sought to define the
anticipated barriers to success. Figure 16 is an interference diagram, which depicts the main
barriers/challenges (in red) to achieving the desired goal or outcome (shown in blue) and the
proposed methods to overcome them (in green). The recommended steps to implement this initiative
have been informed by these potential risks and proposed solutions.
Figure 16 – OMIG Interference Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with DIG staff on 06/27/24.
Recommended steps for establishing an improved and standardized triage process (future
state):
• Identify OIA’s comprehensive data needs to improve investigations and anticipated data
sources. This assessment should include not only the domains of data that would improve
investigations but include identification of any reporting needs or dashboards that would
support utilization of this data.
• Engage partner departments where data sources are housed and build support for initiative
(begin execution of communication plan).
• Form a workgroup with DIS staff, and staff from other impacted departments as needed.
• Engage General Counsel at DIG and impacted departments to develop MOUs to support
DIG’s data access (identifying the sources, frequency, data access process).
• Complete technical requirements to enable data access/sharing and automated tools to
detect FWA.
• Build reporting and dashboards to support investigations.
• Create policies for data governance and use and revise investigation workflows and standard
operating procedures.
• Develop periodic trainings to train staff in value-based FWA, identifying animalities, patter
recognitions, behavior analytics, and predictive modeling techniques.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 19
• Explore opportunities to utilize alternative data sources like social media, all-payer database,
public domain demographics, and automated news feeds; and data analytic tools to mine
the data.
• Train OIA staff on available data sources; methods to access data; and new policies,
workflows, and standard operating procedures.
• Monitor the identified KPIs to assess impact on number of investigations and recoveries
(complete return on investment analysis).
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Reducing fraud and abuse is
central to DIG’s mission and priorities and there are staff dedicated to investigation of Medicaid and
non-Medicaid fraud today. Expanded access to data for OIA enhances the volume of investigations
and the effectiveness and efficiency of investigations. OMIG’s staff have been highly effective in
applying data analytics to address Medicaid fraud and expansion of capacity is likely to increase the
impact of fraud and abuse investigation activities and increase recoveries.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: DIG may consider augmenting its OMIG
internal data analytics resources team but it is recommended this is done in a fiscally neutral manner
through repurposing of vacant positions or to be paid out of expected recoupments. OIA may require
additional technical expertise to develop new data models as part of its investigations (mirroring the
approach used by OMIG).
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: The process changes
will be primarily implemented at OIA, which will need to establish policies and procedures for data
governance and use, as well as interoperability/data exchange.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected impacts of this
initiative are to increase the number of investigations (for OMIG and OIA), improve the quality of and
timeliness of fraud investigations, and increase the amount of recoveries by engaging in systemic,
data-driven approaches. Recommended performance measures include:
• Number of investigations completed
• Average time to close an investigation (by priority level, measured in days)
• % of investigations with a finding of fraud or abuse
• % of completed and successful investigations resulting in a referral to the Attorney General
Fraud Control Unit
• Value of collections identified (in dollars)
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: Based on DIG’s initial analysis and re-evaluation, DIG-2 has the potential positive
annual reoccurring financial impact of up to $500,000, which includes cost savings and cost
avoidance opportunities that could be captured in the future. If this value is captured, it 1) may
address an already agreed upon budget target, 2) may be reinvested, and/or 3) may be harvested in
a budget reduction. This initiative could begin implementation immediately, with benefit being
captured in 6 months, and according to staff, completion of this data initiative occurring in 2026.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 20
Change Management Plan: Collaboration with DHS and other state entities is essential to this
initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are included for each audience in Figure 16. Key
activities and timing for communication plan are included in Appendix A – Work Plan.
Figure 16 – DIG-2 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
External partner • DIG OIA investigations staff • Face-to- • Ricky Quattlebaum
agencies need access to [Insert Name of face • Samantha
Data Set] to be able to meetings Blassingame
complete more investigations with
timely and successfully. department
• The State of Arkansas can leadership
realize significant benefits with • Face-to-
expanded data analytics in face
fraud and abuse investigations, meetings
which will allow the expansion with
from individual cases to division
systemic investigations. leadership
• DIG will implement the
safeguards needed to protect
shared data.
• DIG is building the internal
capabilities to leverage data
use.
• Collaboration is needed to help
both agencies continue to fulfill
missions.
DIG Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 21
Strategic Management Plan:
Arkansas Department of Transformation and
Shared Services
Table of Contents
Overview ..................................................................................................................................... 2
Recommended Organizational Structure ...................................................................................... 4
Meeting the Vision of an Effective and Efficient Future Department: ............................................. 6
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation ................................................... 7
TSS #0 - Optimize TSS manager roles and team size for better control and efficiency......................... 9
TSS #6 - Launch centralized FOIA processing division ..................................................................... 11
TSS #9 - Develop shared services performance framework ............................................................. 22
TSS #10 - Consolidate executive branch boards and commissions .................................................. 32
TSS #11- Improve coordination among procurement roles across the state...................................... 38
TSS #12 - Improve coordination among HR roles across the state .................................................... 48
TSS #13 - Improve coordination among IT roles across the state ...................................................... 57
TSS #30 - Create an IT procurement center of excellence ................................................................ 66
TSS #36 - Establish statewide data hub .......................................................................................... 71
TSS #39 - Deploy Arkansan- and employee-facing platforms to leverage statewide data hub ............ 77
Functional Initiative #4 - Standardize specifications for long tail purchases ..................................... 81
Functional Initiative #11 - Optimize contracts for professional services ........................................... 86
Functional Initiative #25 - Host an OSP roadshow for state departments ......................................... 93
Functional Initiative #27 - Modify governance process for statewide contracted commodities .......... 96
Functional Initiative #41 - Consolidate Little Rock office space in line with metro area ................... 103
Functional Initiative #49 - Consolidate statewide office space outside of Little Rock ...................... 108
Functional Initiative #60 - Collaborate across statewide operational excellence/CX roles ............... 111
Functional Initiative #73 - Standardize and improve large IT program governance and management 116
Functional Initiative #82 - Reduce reliance on outside contractors ................................................ 122
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 1
Overview
Arkansas Department of Transformation and Shared Services (TSS) is recognized as the
administrative arm of Arkansas state government. Its focus is to identify efficiencies and cost-saving
measures to streamline operations while providing optimal service to the state. TSS was formed in
2019 following the passage of Act 910, known as the “Transformation and Efficiencies Act” of the
92nd General Assembly.
TSS achieves its mission by supporting all departments and agencies through shared services and
implementing new and ongoing transformation initiatives throughout state government. In addition
to the Secretary’s Office, TSS is comprised of the Division of Building Authority (DBA), the Division of
Information Systems (DIS), the Office of State Procurement (OSP), the Arkansas Geographic
Information Systems Office (GIS), the Employee Benefits Division (EBD), the Office of Personnel
Management (OPM), and
Below in Figure 1 is a table of TSS’ six component offices at TSS and their mission statements and
core functions.
Figure 1 – TSS Component Offices/Divisions
The Division of Building Authority • Leasing agent for private sector and state-owned
(DBA) mission is to act as the State’s property leasing
agent in all state lease negotiations; • Maintains and operates a building portfolio of 1.6
provide direction, assistance, and million square feet
approvals to Departments in all • Provides architectural and engineering design
Division of Building aspects of capital improvement reviews and conducts formal bidding and site
Authority (DBA) projects and property transfers needs; inspection for capital improvement projects
and actively maintain and operate • Assists with property purchase or disposition
DBA owned or managed buildings transactions
efficiently and economically • Manages the Sustainable Building Revolving Loan
according to laws, rules, and Program for promoting energy-efficient upgrades
regulations • Provides oversight for the State’s Public Private
Partnership (P3) contracting program
The Division of Information Systems • Works 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, to ensure
(DIS) mission is “Empowering the public services provided by the state
citizens of Arkansas through Departments, boards and commissions, K-12
Technology." The DIS Cybersecurity public schools, institutions of higher education,
Office establishes security standards and city and county governments are always
Division of and policies for information available to the citizens of Arkansas
Information Services technology in state government and • Hosts critical applications that enable citizens to
(DIS) serves as the focal point for access online public services
cybersecurity issues. The office • Provides the following services: data center
monitors and protects the state hosting services, network services, storage, and
network and responds to any threats backup services, voice services, operational
to the state’s technology services, professional services, etc. Examples
infrastructure. include Data Storage, Network Security, Private
Cloud for Public Sector, Email, Windows Desktop
support, Application Development, and more
The Office of State Procurement (OSP) • Registers business owners who supply the State
serves the citizens of Arkansas by with commodities or services
ethically, efficiently, and transparently • Posts opportunities to bid on State contracts
procures quality commodities and
services for the State. OSP works to
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 2
Office of State make sure Arkansas Procurement • Assists State Departments in their solicitations
Procurement (OSP) Law and best practices are applied for commodities and services
whenever commodities and services • Reviews contracts submitted for legislative
for the various Departments of the review
State are purchased. • Manages the State purchase card program
The Division of Geographic • Maintains the Arkansas Master Address Program,
Information Systems (Arkansas GIS Arkansas Centerline File, Municipal Boundary
Office) mission is to promote the and Annexation Program, County Assessor
efficient development, maintenance, Mapping Program, Arkansas Digital Ortho imagery
Geographic and distribution of Arkansas’ Program, Corner Restoration Program, and Survey
Information Systems geographic information resources. Plat Archival
(GIS) The GIS Office also houses the
Division of Land Surveys. Its mission
is to be the national leader for the
state's archival, preservation, and
restoration of the Public Land Survey
System.
The Employee Benefits Division (EBD) • Operationalizes decisions made by the State and
oversees the Health and Life Public School Health and Life Insurance Board
Insurance Plans for State and Public • Audits and provides oversight of vendor partners
School employees. EBD serves that service ARBenefits members
Employee Benefits 158,000 members from state • Provides customer service to members and
Division (EBD) departments and agencies and 300+ Health Insurance Representatives by phone or in-
school districts. Coverage reaches person at EBD offices
new hires, active employees, retirees, • Travels the state to educate members on the
and covered dependents. EBD strives ARBenefits plan and benefits
to ensure members have access to
healthcare by providing affordable
plans with rich benefits.
The Office of Personnel Management • Establishes job classifications, including job
(OPM) administers the state’s duties and minimum requirements to perform
personnel system and establishes each job, as well as the statewide pay scale
necessary policies and procedures to • Manages payroll system and ensures that all
Office of Personnel ensure system uniformity under state state employees are timely paid
Management and federal laws. OPM provides for • Establishes and maintains the statewide
the efficient utilization of state performance evaluation system
resources and the effective • Develops catalog of training courses for
management of Classification and employee development and job performance
Compensation, Payroll, and Training. • Manages programs: grievance procedure,
catastrophic leave, and employee suggestions
Source: Division mission statements taken from AR.gov,
https://portal.arkansas.gov/state_agencies/department-of-transformation-and-shared-services/.
TSS’ initial purpose was to increase efficiencies in state government by pooling resources and
provide a base for shared services in the offices consolidated within the agency. However through
the Arkansas Forward project, a 2024 initiative to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of
Arkansas’ 15 cabinet-level departments, TSS identified several opportunities to enhance its function
as a shared services entity, and support the work of the other departments across the state through
an enterprise-level approach. TSS believes a shared-services model related to four core functions --
Human Resources, IT, Real Estate, and Procurement -- will improve efficiencies.
This Strategic Management Plan (“Plan”) memorializes the work completed by TSS during Arkansas
Forward, translating its vision into a plan including its recommended organizational structure, key
initiatives prioritized for immediate implementation, and related performance metrics (as captured
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 3
in each of the subsequent sections). A companion project plan (“Work Plan”) provides a more
detailed resource to support implementation of the initiatives by TSS’ Arkansas Forward project
management team.
Recommended Organizational Structure
TSS’s current organization chart is shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2 – Current Organizational Structure
As part of Arkansas Forward, TSS’s structure was reviewed to identify opportunities for redesign in
three areas:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission;
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives; and,
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions.
TSS faces the dual challenge of becoming a more efficient and agile organization, and planning for
the future of greater centralization of shared services. Balancing these competing priorities results
in a nuanced path forward for the department. Recommendations for TSS’ future state organization,
based on department interviews and analysis include:
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 4
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission: Creation of a
project management office (PMO) under the organization of the Chief of Staff is needed to
support implementation of Arkansas Forward. This team will engage the departmental
project managers, complete project status reporting, and provide support to the Chief of
Staff in driving the work forward.
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives: Diagnostic
analysis identified the opportunity to review the span of control (team size) and organization
of the Division of Information Services (DIS), the Division of Building Authority (DBA), and the
State Surplus (reporting to the Chief of Staff). Throughout these functions, there are multiple
instances of a leader with 1-2 reports, including several of the same position title. In some
instances in which teams can be consolidated to improve collaboration and efficiency, with
some leaders transitioned to senior subject-matter roles with no impact on pay, but this
would require OPM to create these positions, which do not exist currently. DIS’ organization
review was paused until further decisions about shared services centralization are made.
Some of the small teams may be enlarged to account for additional staff transfers and DIS
may reallocate existing leaders to supervise new functions, which would widen their span of
control. Retention of DIS’ top talent is important in preparing the division for an expanded
statewide role. A more detailed discussion of planned review activities for the other impacted
areas will follow in TSS-0.
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions:
Based on direction from the Arkansas Forward Steering Committee, there is a need for both
OPM and DIS to prepare for the transfer of additional resources from other departments as
they centralize the payroll and help desk functions. OPM’s organization is lean and fairly flat,
with reasonable and balanced spans of control today, but will need to plan for growth. TSS
will need to prepare its organization for the increased responsibility and number of
employees, which will require additional staff to perform these duties and may result in
added layers of middle management. Throughout this report, recommendations for how TSS
can strengthen its organizational capabilities are noted. There are several strategic
investments flagged throughout the report including for project management and
communication resources, and instances in which outside subject matter consultants may
guide the TSS team in the implementation of these initiatives.
Recommendations for TSS’ future state organization are included in Figure 3. The boxes shown in
blue represent new shared services functions which will be reporting to TSS’ management team.
Decisions about the structuring of those teams have not yet been determined by TSS. Boxes in green
show areas for review by division leadership for potential span of control and layer issues.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 5
Figure 3 – Recommended Organizational Structure
Meeting the Vision of an Effective and Efficient Future Department:
As a department charged with transformation and improvement, TSS can take steps to make its
current organization structure more efficient, serving as a model for the other cabinet-level
departments. An initial investment in project management resources will provide support to sustain
the work of Arkansas Forward. To drive the effective centralization of state services in the areas
contemplated under Arkansas Forward, TSS must also ready its organization for the expected growth
in staff (to be accomplished via transfers from other departments, at no net increase to the State of
Arkansas) and responsibilities for additional functions. Additional resources (whether through
transfer of positions or new positions) would be required to implement the additional human
resources and information technology shared services contemplated for transfer to TSS). In addition,
implementation of a change management strategy that places the customer experience of its peer
departments, a commitment to service level improvement, and transparency at the center will
support this statewide shift toward efficiency.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 6
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward
Implementation
TSS leadership generated over 190 ideas to improve departmental effectiveness and efficiency,
before prioritizing 19 initiatives for immediate implementation as part of Arkansas Forward. These
ideas included initiatives identified through TSS workshops (known as “TSS initiatives”) and
initiatives that were developed as a result of the cross-functional workstreams (“Functional
Initiatives” or FUNC”). The origin of the recommendation is noted in the naming convention for the
initiative. The complete list of the high priority Arkansas Forward initiatives for the department is
provided in numerical order, for ease of navigation and includes:
• TSS-0 – Optimize TSS manager roles and team size for better control and efficiency
• TSS-6 – Launch centralized FOIA processing division
• TSS-9 – Develop shared services performance framework
• TSS-10 – Consolidate executive branch boards and commissions
• TSS-11 – Improve coordination among procurement roles across the state
• TSS-12 – Improve coordination among HR roles across the state
• TSS-13 – Improve coordination among IT roles across the state
• TSS-30 – Create an IT procurement center of excellence
• TSS-36 – Establish a statewide data hub
• TSS-39 – Deploy Arkansan- and employee-facing platforms to leverage statewide data hub
• FUNC-4 – Standardize specifications for long tail purchases and award state contracts for
those purchases
• FUNC-11 – Optimize professional services contracts
• FUNC-25 – Host an OSP roadshow for state departments
• FUNC-27 – Modify governance process for statewide contracted commodities
• FUNC-41 – Consolidate Little Rock office space in line with metro area plan
• FUNC-49 – Consolidate statewide office space outside of Little Rock
• FUNC-60 – Collaborate across statewide operational excellence and citizen experience roles
• FUNC-73 – Standardize and improve large IT program governance and management
• FUNC-82 – Reduce reliance on outside contractors
In addition to listing the initiatives in numerical order above, a functional organization follows, which
groups reports of similar subject matter:
Facilities
• FUNC-41 – Consolidate Little Rock office space in line with metro area plan
• FUNC-49 – Consolidate statewide office space outside of Little Rock
Procurement
• TSS-11 – Improve coordination among procurement roles across the state
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 7
• FUNC-4 – Standardize specifications for long tail purchases and award state contracts for
those purchases
• FUNC-11 – Optimize professional services contracts
• FUNC-25 – Host an OSP roadshow for state departments
• FUNC-27 – Modify governance process for statewide contracted commodities
Information Technology
• TSS-13 – Improve coordination among IT roles across the state
• TSS-36 – Establish a statewide data hub
• TSS-39 – Deploy Arkansan- and employee-facing platforms to leverage statewide data hub
• FUNC-73 – Standardize and improve large IT program governance and management
Human Resources
• TSS-12 – Improve coordination among HR roles across the state
• FUNC-82 – Reduce reliance on outside contractors
Other TSS Initiatives
• TSS-0 – Optimize TSS manager roles and team size for better control and efficiency
• TSS-6 – Launch centralized FOIA processing division
• TSS-9 – Develop shared services performance framework
• TSS-10 – Consolidate executive branch boards and commissions
• FUNC-60 – Collaborate across statewide operational excellence and citizen experience roles
TSS’ focus as part of Arkansas Forward is to manage the centralization of multiple statewide
functions to help the State of Arkansas realize the intended benefits from its shared services strategy.
It should be noted that initiatives TSS-9-13 and several of the functional items contemplate
centralization of various shared services at TSS and the drafts for these sections may provide helpful
information to the initiative owners who are navigating their implementation. In each section,
relevant best practices are included, but the core themes and lessons learned extend across several
initiatives: communication, change management, and project management, among others. TSS has
an opportunity to collaborate with the peer states who have implemented these strategies and are
highlighted in this report, including by conducting site visits and meetings to learn about their
experiences firsthand.
At the heart of this centralization is the importance of customer service and transparency about
performance. The initiatives that contemplate centralization of various functions (such as TSS-11-13)
are not only about centralization for efficiency’s sake, but also seek to leverage the expertise of a
central team at TSS to deliver improved performance for the State of Arkansas and other cabinet-
level departments. Notably, TSS-9, which directs TSS to establish a shared services performance
framework (deployed through a tool such as a dashboard), is a building block for TSS to create
support for centralization, establish accountability for performance, and drive continuous
improvement. Throughout these drafts, there are discussions about the importance of adopting
service-level agreements to formalize the relationship between departments and to foster
accountability for TSS’ delivery of those services.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 8
Initiative TSS #0 - Optimize TSS manager roles and team size for better
control and efficiency
This initiative seeks to optimize TSS manager roles and team size to create a more agile and efficient
organization. It is a primary component of Arkansas Forward: for each cabinet-level department to
build an agile organization. It includes implementation of a tailored and modernized organization to
ensure effective distribution of management responsibilities, enhanced operational efficiency, and
improved role clarity among managerial positions.
Initiative Overview and Current State: TSS’ divisions are unique and distinct in their
responsibilities. To identify opportunities for improvement, the following process was utilized:
• Leadership review of diagnostic tools and existing organization charts to find high-level areas
of priority across all of TSS’ divisions. Examples of the functions tested during this step
included span of control, organizational shape, and number of organizational layers.
• Meetings conducted with Chief of Staff and division leaders of DBA, DIS, OPM, and OSP to
review diagnostic tools and identify opportunities for improvement within their organizations.
• Leadership review of recommendations collected.
Rationale: Recommendations identified through the above process include:
• Prioritize DBA and State Surplus for first round of organizational improvements. There are
multiple instances of supervisors with small teams, likely a function of location. There is an
opportunity to increase span of control and expand team size, allowing for like positions to
collaborate as members of a team. In some instances, certain leaders can transition to
senior subject matter roles, pending the creation of these positions by OPM as part of the
State Pay Plan.
• Pause reorganization of DIS until decisions about shared services are determined (e.g., the
initial decision about Help Desk transfer has been made, but there may be additional staff
moves if application support and development moves to DIS). DIS will need to conduct a
more thorough analysis and discussion with impacted departments to identify how many
staff will likely transition to DIS and what the corresponding team structure should be.
• Regarding readiness for shared services, DIS and OPM will require transfer of additional staff
from other departments (no net increase to the state), particularly if service levels are
established that elevate performance above the status quo (e.g., faster turnaround times,
shorter timeframe for resolution of tickets). OSP is likely understaffed based on current
duties (not assuming any major centralization of duties) and if there are expectations for
increased volume of work due to departments using OSP for the types of procurements they
currently handle in-house, the staffing demand will increase further. A department-by-
department analysis of staff will be required to determine the intended impact to TSS’
resources.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps
in the recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with TSS staff include:
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 9
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• TSS needs a clear communication plan for each division’s organizational changes and point
of contact regarding any staff moves. TSS needs to ensure that leaders understand the “why”
behind moves and can support change in their conversations with staff (may need one-
pagers or frequently asked questions). This is particularly important for managers
• Resources should be made available for newly formed teams to support team building and
to support the teams’ reforming and ability to become high performing teams.
Recommended steps to implement changes to TSS’s organization structure include:
• Identify changes required by division (complete).
• Develop financial model (i.e., cost allocation methodology or method of charging
departments for shared services) and funding sources.
• Review legal implications of proposed changes (in process).
• Obtain leadership approval for changes (in process).
• DBA and Chief of Staff (overseeing State Surplus) to prepare proposed organization charts
based on efficiency improvements opportunities identified.
• DIS and OPM to begin planning for organization structure changes and assumption of shared
services duties.
• Develop a Communication Plan – Need clear communication plan and point of contact
regarding any staff moves, need to ensure leaders understand “why” behind moves and can
support change.
o Coordinate the announcements to support staff. It is best practice for staff to receive
news of a transfer or major team change from their direct supervisor. If staff are moving
teams, they should also receive contact from their new supervisor. After all individuals
impacted directly by major team changes or moves are notified, a team meeting should
occur. As these conversations move to deeper layers of the organization, it becomes
important for leaders to be ambassadors of the message. The leadership team should
understand what is happening and why so they can facilitate these discussions.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: The proposed
organization chart for TSS is provided above in Figure 3. Realignment of TSS in these areas will help
the department further achieve its mission and implement Arkansas Forward.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: Formation of central teams in the shared services areas will result in the need to review and
revise team protocols (i.e., Human Resources will need to implement one timekeeping policy, one
onboarding process for new staff).
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: This initiative is not
expected to result in additional costs. Most of the proposed organization changes would be achieved
through the use of existing vacancies and other internal changes; in instances where this is not the
case, OPM and Legislative approval is needed.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 10
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: Proposed
metrics to assess the impact of this initiative include:
• Span of control (size); and,
• Number of organization layers.
In addition to these measures, surveys could be utilized for impacted staff during the transition to
identify and address any issues or concerns.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: This change is not expected to yield cost savings but it will be an enabling
factor contributing to greater efficiency at TSS.
Change Management Plan: Clear communication with staff about the purpose for the
changes should accompany any information on the new process changes. Recommended
messaging and modalities are included for each audience in Figure 4. Key activities and timing for
communication plan are included in Appendix A – TSS Work Plan.
Figure 4 – TSS-0 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Staff impacted by • TSS is making some changes in • Town hall. • Secretary Fisken
changes our organization structure as • Face-to-Face • Impacted division
part of Arkansas Forward. team leads
• TSS is investing in our team as a meetings with • Communication
strategy to help us better serve leadership, Director
our customers and fulfill our future
mission. manager, and
• Detailed description of former
changes, including specific manager.
changes for every team
impacted by the reorganization.
Everyone continues to have a
place on the team.
Other TSS staff • These changes are to • Town hall. • Communication
strengthen our team, support • All staff Director
collaboration, and enable more email.
efficient decision-making.
• High level summary of
changes.
Initiative TSS #6 - Launch centralized FOIA processing division
This initiative includes creating a centralized Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request processing
division to field, triage, and fulfill FOIA requests and reduce administrative burden on state
employees. Implementing this initiative has the potential to improve the efficiency and accuracy of
FOIA requests to improve agency functionality and response quality and volume.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 11
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Arkansas Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)
of 1967 governs the request and provision of information of public record. The intent of the FOIA is to
ensure an open government by elevating transparency so that citizens may be fully informed of the
workings of their government and the actions of their public officials. 1
Under Arkansas’s FOIA law, state agencies have three working days to respond to a FOIA request with
the requested public information if a public record is in active use or storage and therefore not
available at the time a citizen asks to examine it; if it is available, it must be provided immediately.
Departments, the custodians of the records, must determine within twenty-four hours of the receipt
of the request whether the records are exempt from disclosure under state law. Either the custodian,
requester, or the subject of the records may immediately seek an opinion from the Attorney General,
who, within three working days of receipt of the request must issue an opinion stating whether the
decision regarding the release of information is consistent with FOIA. When FOIA requests
necessitate this level of review, they can become timely and cumbersome for the state agencies.
Currently, requests under FOIA for Arkansas state department-held public information are handled at
each of the 15 cabinet-level departments, all of which are responsible for responding to FOIA requests
received for their public records. For example, today in the Department of Public Safety, there are
three attorneys that devote most of their time to addressing FOIA issues, when some of their time
could be directed to other mission critical duties. Under state law, each state agency, board, and
commission is required to prepare and make available the methods by which the public may obtain
access to public records and a list and general description of its records, including computer
databases.
While this enables subject-matter experts from the agencies to respond to FOIA requests requiring in-
depth content knowledge, many FOIA requests do not require this level of expertise, and agency legal
staff are constrained by the time requirements needed to review documents to be sent out in response
to a FOIA request. Anecdotally, requests received are often poorly defined, making it challenging to
respond timely.
TSS has a dedicated FOIA Officer. This employee is the point of contact for all requests for records.
The FOIA Officer maintains an electronic record of all received requests at TSS and tracks the status
of fulfillment for each request. Each entity within TSS has a designated point of contact who
coordinates with the FOIA Officer in identifying the requested records, redacting any possible
exemption, and providing those records to the FOIA Officer within the appropriate timeline. The
division point of contact works through the TSS FOIA Officer and in conjunction with legal. Year-to-
date 2024, TSS’ FOIA Office has received 80 actionable requests and approximately 200 requests from
non-citizens or custodians, which do not require resolution per statute.
In 2015, the Arkansas General Assembly established the Open Data and Transparency Task Force to
determine the best practices to achieve the most efficient systems for maintaining and delivering the
state’s public records and data. This task force issued a report in December 2016 which
recommended creating the position of chief data officer housed within DIS at TSS to lead a data
warehouse program. Following these recommendations, Act 912 of 2017 created the positions of the
1
2022 Arkansas FOIA handbook.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 12
Chief Data Officer (CDO) and Chief Privacy Officer (CPO), established the Data and Transparency
Panel (DTP) and required completion of a feasibility and cost study on the development of a statewide
data warehouse program. These ongoing efforts are known as the ARDATA team housed with the
Secretary’s Office at TSS.
In 2017, the Arkansas General Assembly created the “Arkansas Freedom of Information Task Force:”
a State sponsored entity given “the responsibility of evaluating proposals being promoted by various
members of the State Legislature which, if adopted, would affect, in some way, the Arkansas Freedom
of Information Act of 1967, as amended.” The Task Force includes 9 appointees, including: 2
• One (1) member appointed by the Governor;
• One (1) member appointed by the President Pro Tempore of the Senate;
• One (1) member appointed by the Speaker of the House of Representatives;
• One (1) member appointed by the Arkansas Press Association, Inc.;
• One (1) member appointed by the Arkansas Freedom of Information Coalition;
• One (1) member appointed by the Arkansas Pro Chapter of the Society of Professional
Journalists;
• One (1) member appointed by the Arkansas Broadcasters Association;
• One (1) member appointed by the Association of Arkansas Counties; and
• One (1) member appointed by the Arkansas Municipal League.
Rationale: By centralizing all state FOIA requests through TSS, the State could streamline
operations, reduce costs, and improve transparency. Initiative TSS-6 directs TSS to create a
statewide centralized FOIA processing division, which could involve greater dedication of
resources for personnel and materials.
Consolidating FOIA requests and channeling them through a centralized request processing division
at TSS will enable department legal staff to devote more time and resources to their department-
centric functions. In addition, centralizing some FOIA functions has the potential to improve the
efficiency and accuracy of FOIA requests to improve agency functionality and response quality and
volume.
TSS’ goal is to achieve government transparency by enabling the public to review public records,
accounting for exemptions that protect government functions by not compromising policy or certain
operations. A strategic compass for this initiative can be seen below in Figure 5. This figure presents
the overarching goal of the initiative and the high-level process steps and constraints.
2
Arkansas Code, 25-19-111.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 13
Figure 5 – FOIA Process Strategic Compass
Source: Work session with TSS staff on June 25, 2024.
As one possible model for consideration, Hawaii operates a separate state agency charged with
interpreting, advising and enforcing the law and releases information in an open data format. The
“Office of Information Practices” (OIP) is administratively attached to the Department of Accounting
and General Services. OIP provides uniform interpretation, advice, and training on two Hawaii laws
intended to promote open and transparent government: the Uniform Information Practices Act
(UIPA), which requires open access to government records, and the Sunshine Law, which requires
open public meetings. OIP renders advice and assistance on questions concerning the public’s right
to access to government records or meetings and provides training to help agencies comply with the
laws. OIP’s Attorney of the Day service enables members of the public or government agencies to
email or call the agency to obtain general, non-binding advice regarding the UIPA or Sunshine laws.
OIP does not act as a clearinghouse processing all the record requests for government agencies
statewide, however it administers the “Records Report System” (RRS), a digital database containing
a description of more than 29,000 record titles from records maintained by State and county
government agencies. In addition, through its Attorney of the Day service, OIP achieved same-day
resolution of 89% of the approximately 1,584 formal and informal requests for services that it
received and resolved in fiscal year 2022. OIP reports that agencies usually conform to OIP’s informal
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 14
advice, preventing or quickly resolving disputes that would otherwise lead to more labor-intensive
formal cases. 3 According to data issued by OIP, of 2,253 formal requests to state agencies received
in FY 2023, 366 (16%) were personal record requests, 124 (6%) were complex requests, and the
remaining 1,763 (78%) were nonpersonal and noncomplex requests, i.e. “typical” requests. This
suggests that, assuming Arkansas state agencies receive a similar breakdown in public records
requests, a large majority do not require substantive subject matter expertise or specialized
knowledge of department data.
By learning from this model, Arkansas and TSS have the potential to establish a centralized FOIA
function to aid in cutting down on agency time to respond to FOIA requests, by handling non-complex
or non-specialized information requests. For other requests requiring more content-related
knowledge, TSS should consider utilizing a model such as “Attorney of the Day” as implemented in
Hawaii (see above) where TSS can consult with other departments to ensure responses are provided
accurately and timely.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps
in the recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of
other state best practices include:
Figure 6 illustrates some of the barriers to success identified by staff in implementing a statewide
FOIA process. The barriers to achieving the goal are shown in red and solutions to overcome them
are shown in green.
3
“The Facts about the Office of Information Practices,” April 21, 2023, https://oip.hawaii.gov/the-facts-about-
the-office-of-information-practices/.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 15
Figure 6 – FOIA Process Interference Diagram
Source: Work session with TSS staff on June 25, 2024.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 16
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• The volume of requests is often significant; having an external review firm or utilizing
eDiscovery software can help address this risk.
• Department subject-matter complexity may be difficult to centralize, and agency-specific
exemptions require Subject Mater Experts (SMEs) and legal reviews; strategies to address
these risks include having specialized areas of focus for centralized team members, doing
regular trainings, and establishing a FOIA Taskforce with agency reps.
• Leverage TSS capabilities to deploy materials to Arkansans about FOIA improvements to
address the risk that perception of changed FOIA processes among Arkansans could be
negative.
• TSS will lead implementation of a centralized FOIA function, and lead the collaboration effort
with Governor’s Office, Freedom of Information Task Force, and departmental General
Counsels to ensure policies and practices developed will appropriately meet the needs of
the state.
• TSS must collect and understand confidentiality requirements, as not all records can be
shared between state departments/entities.
Recommended steps for implementing centralized FOIA function (future state):
TSS staff identified the following key process steps as part of a facilitated work session:
• Identify workgroup of state staff to conduct a needs assessment – request each department
to share data on the number and nature of FOIA requests to inform this assessment:
o Establish a diverse needs assessment group comprising various agencies and legal
experts.
o Ensure representation from key departments with large number of FOIA requests to
provide comprehensive insights into FOIA challenges and improvement
opportunities.
• Conduct FOIA needs assessment to identify current FOIA processing challenges and
improvement opportunities:
o Identify team goals and objectives:
Define clear, measurable goals and objectives for the Task Force based on
the findings of the needs assessment.
Align objectives with overarching state transparency and efficiency targets to
guide the initiative effectively.
o Identify departments to participate in FOIA needs assessment:
Identify a spectrum of agencies with varied FOIA demands to ensure a
representative sample for the assessment.
Engage agencies early to foster collaboration and buy-in for the assessment
process and subsequent reforms.
o Discuss eDiscovery software options with DIS to support identification and
packaging of materials for public release (e.g., emails, reports, and other
deliverables).
• Identify team size, roles, and individuals that make up the response team (known as FOIA
Taskforce):
o Inventory of agencies’ eDiscovery software tools and comparative benefits and
drawbacks:
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 17
Compile a comprehensive inventory detailing each agency's eDiscovery
software tools, evaluating their functionalities and limitations
Assess the compatibility of existing tools with FOIA requirements to inform
potential upgrades or standardized solutions
o Inventory of agencies' FOIA processes and the comparative benefits and
drawbacks:
Document current FOIA processes across agencies, highlighting strengths
and weaknesses in responsiveness and transparency
Compare efficiencies and legal compliance across agencies to identify
opportunities for harmonization and improvement
• Identify optimal system or systems to support expedited/timely FOIA responses, redaction
capability, and document chain of custody maintenance:
o Involve Governor’s Office and Legislature in planning and development of the future
state:
Engage the Governor’s Office and Legislature early in the planning phase to
secure commitment and alignment with the initiative's objectives
Leverage high-level support to navigate potential regulatory or legislative
changes necessary for implementation.
o Obtain Legislative and Governor’s Office support:
Secure formal endorsements from the Legislative and Governor’s Office to
solidify backing for the initiative’s strategic goals.
Foster ongoing communication to address any concerns and ensure
continued support throughout implementation.
o Develop appropriations/funding mechanism, including cost-sharing among
departments:
Formulate a detailed funding mechanism outlining cost-sharing strategies
with participating agencies.
Outline a budget proposal that addresses system implementation and
operational costs, ensuring sustainable funding sources.
• Consider a centralized process where not all resources migrate to TSS: for highly complex,
specific requests, TSS would engage experts from the impacted departments.
o Consider: Role of DIS in supporting email and file identification and transmission.
o Consider Hawaii example with “Attorney of the Day” support model.
o Consider: seeking legislation to expand the Arkansas Freedom of Information
Taskforce to include agency representatives or create a TSS FOIA taskforce including
agency representatives.
• Secure authority with OPM assistance through legislative process to transfer team
members to TSS (position authority and budgetary authority) and establish new team.
Engage Office of Personnel management to enable this transfer and Legislative approval as
needed.
o Complete a return-on-investment analysis by department to capture the savings
opportunities by consolidating activities under one department (i.e., the three
attorneys at the Department of Public Safety who could be freed-up and diverted to
other purposes and elimination of need to hire a fourth attorney as is planned today).
• Develop policy for new FOIA team.
o Best Practices review:
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 18
Conduct a thorough review of national and state-specific best practices in
FOIA management to inform policy development.
Benchmark against industry standards to incorporate proven methodologies
into the centralized FOIA framework.
o eDiscovery software training:
Develop tailored training sessions to familiarize agency staff with eDiscovery
software functionalities and compliance requirements.
Offer hands-on workshops to ensure proficiency in using software tools to
streamline FOIA response processes.
o Training materials from Attorney General:
Collaborate with the Attorney General’s office to develop comprehensive
training materials addressing legal nuances and updates.
Incorporate legal precedents and case studies into training modules to
enhance understanding of FOIA compliance requirements.
o Develop training materials for specific subject matters:
Create specialized training materials focusing on distinct FOIA subject
matters such as privacy, redaction, and exemptions.
Customize content to address agency-specific challenges and ensure
uniform understanding of FOIA guidelines.
o Develop training regarding coordination with the Division of Information Services
(when FOIA requests can be satisfied by DIS, i.e., files and emails):
Design training sessions centered on requests for DIS, outlining
standardized workflows for efficient handling.
Incorporate feedback from legal advisors to ensure alignment with legal
standards and procedural fairness.
o Consolidate material into a uniform process:
Streamline training materials and procedural guidelines into a cohesive
user-friendly format accessible to all FOIA stakeholders.
Ensure consistency in messaging and procedural steps to foster
transparency and streamline response efforts.
o Validate with Attorney General:
Validate proposed FOIA processes and guidelines with the Attorney
General’s office to ensure legal compliance and consistency.
Seek expert advice to refine processes and address any legal implications or
concerns early in the development phase.
o Validate with departments:
Solicit feedback from participating agencies to validate proposed FOIA
processes and guidelines against practical operational scenarios.
Incorporate agency insights to tailor processes and enhance feasibility and
effectiveness across diverse administrative contexts.
o Documentation of uniform process:
Document finalized FOIA processes and guidelines in a standardized format
for internal reference and external transparency.
Include procedural workflows and compliance checkpoints to facilitate
consistent implementation and oversight.
• Establish standardized FOIA request processes and guidelines, both internal to the FOIA
team and external to govern how the FOIA team interacts with departmental stakeholders
o Vet with Governor’s Office and Legislature:
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 19
Present finalized FOIA request processes and guidelines to the Governor’s
Office and Legislature for validation and endorsement.
Seek input to refine guidelines and ensure alignment with state transparency
goals and legislative requirements.
o Address public relations concerns and inform the public:
Develop a communications strategy to address public concerns and
promote awareness of the enhanced FOIA processes.
Provide public updates on improvements and achievements to enhance
transparency and public trust.
• Establish clear protocols for revising and updating guidelines based on evolving legislative
requirements and stakeholder feedback.
• Train FOIA team and external stakeholders on new approach to FOIA response:
o Design training based on developed processes and guidelines:
Customize training modules based on finalized FOIA processes and
guidelines to address specific roles and responsibilities.
Tailor content to ensure comprehensive understanding of procedural
changes and compliance requirements.
o Implement training with ongoing updates:
Roll out training initiatives with regular updates to reflect any revisions or
enhancements to FOIA processes.
Incorporate feedback from training sessions to refine educational materials
and ensure continuous improvement.
• Monitor ongoing impact of FOIA centralization and adapt as needed
o Implement a monitoring framework to track the impact of centralized FOIA
processes on responsiveness and transparency.
Define performance metrics aligned with transparency goals to measure the
effectiveness of centralized FOIA processes (suggested metrics are
identified below; will need to establish internal benchmark or target for each
selected metric).
Establish benchmarks to track response times, compliance rates, and
stakeholder satisfaction for continuous improvement.
o Update on regular schedule and consult with the Task Force on the results:
Schedule regular updates to report on the progress and outcomes of
centralized FOIA initiatives to the Task Force.
Collaborate with Task Force members to analyze findings and adjust
strategies as needed to optimize FOIA operations.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Establishment
of a statewide FOIA team would be a new statewide service for TSS to administer; TSS is positioned
to fulfill this function effectively on behalf of the State of Arkansas and the purpose of this centralized
team aligns with TSS’ overall mission. During the needs assessment, TSS should identify staff
resources at other departments with expertise in FOIA and volume of requests fulfill statewide, to
determine how many team members will be needed to transfer to TSS to support this effort.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial TSS staff analysis
indicates that a dedicated project team with expertise in FOIA processing and project management
will be required, as well as new or upgraded systems. TSS would require an investment in eDiscovery
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 20
staff and resources for staff training, and that some staff would transfer to TSS to support the
establishment of this function (no net increase to the State of Arkansas). TSS estimates a statewide
FOIA process will have a potential positive annual financial impact of around $400,000 per year from
expected cost avoidance to departments (this will be realized across all departmental budgets,
including TSS). A focused team of resources, working full-time on FOIA requests should achieve
efficiencies in fulfilling these requests.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: TSS will need to create policies and procedures to establish a centralized FOIA process at
TSS, including engaging individual departmental staff as needed for complex FOIA requests.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to improve the number, speed, and accuracy of FOIA request responses
as well as free up agency legal and administrative staff time otherwise dedicated to responding to
FOIA requests. Recommended performance measures include:
• Average time to complete FOIA request;
• Number of requests completed annually (is not expected to change as a result of the initiative
but workload should be tracked to measure efficiency of process);
• Uniformity of compliance and responsiveness across departments; and,
• Number of hours saved for staff across agencies not responding to FOIA requests (estimated
based on the total number of requests received and an estimated average time per request
that would have been incurred by the department had the centralized process not been
established).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: It is expected the statewide expenditures for FOIA will decrease as a result
of this request. It is not anticipated that the potential savings noted above can be captured by directly
TSS (savings above would be realized within the individual departments where resources are
currently expended on FOIA). TSS will need to develop a costing methodology to charge departments
for FOIA services or propose to consolidate appropriations for FOIA activities at its department.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across state agencies, state leadership, and with
citizens is critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are included for each
audience in Figure 7. Key activities and timing for communication plan are included in Appendix A –
TSS Work Plan.
Figure 7 – TSS-6 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
State Department • Centralized FOIA function will • Agency emails • Courtney
General Counsels reduce resource strain on GCs • Town-hall style Traylor, TSS
and other admin/legal staff virtual meeting • Jessica
allowing them to focus on core • Emails Patterson
functions (TSS) and
Kelsey
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 21
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
• Agency GCs/legal will be Swindle
utilized as subject matter (Governor’s
experts as needed; process Office)
developed to obtain
information as needed
State leadership: • Consolidating FOIA responses • Leadership • Courtney
Governor’s Office, within TSS will improve meetings Traylor, TSS
Attorney General’s accuracy and timeliness of • Emails • Jessica
Office responses, potentially reduce • Legislative Patterson
costs, and save staff time briefings (TSS) and
Kelsey
Swindle
(Governor’s
Office)
Arkansans • Arkansas is committed to • Social media • Courtney
transparent and open • Open Traylor, TSS
government-enabling one trainings/info • Jessica
agency to oversee FOIA sessions for the Patterson
improves citizens’ abilities to public (TSS) and
ask questions and get Kelsey
information about their tax Swindle
dollars and how they are being (Governor’s
used Office)
• Cost to administering FOIA
process is [INSERT] and this
initiative seeks to use taxpayer
dollars more wisely
• TSS’ function is to improve the
efficiency of state government
operations; FOIA responses
will fit well within the scope of
the agency
AR Freedom of • Consolidating FOIA responses • Open meetings • Courtney
Information Task Force within TSS will improve with task force, Traylor, TSS
accuracy and timeliness of news • Jessica
responses, potentially reduce organizations, Patterson
costs, and save staff time advocacy groups (TSS) and
• The Task Force will play a role • Social Media Kelsey
in ensuring FOIA function Swindle
remains responsive and (Governor’s
appropriate Office)
Note: There are intentional placeholders for initiative owners to add more detail to the messages
once developed.
Initiative TSS #9 - Develop shared services performance framework
This initiative includes the development of a performance framework for shared services that defines
the customer base, establishes success metrics, and tracks and mitigates underperformance to
those metrics. The establishment of service level expectations for all shared services functions and
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 22
a dashboard or “report card” that provides accountability for performance, will help TSS build trust
and confidence in TSS’ capacity to lead additional shared services functions. In addition, in the
future, if TSS shifts to a funding model where departments purchase certain services from TSS,
establishment of a performance framework will be an important component to this model.
Initiative Overview and Current State: TSS’ primary focus is to identify efficiencies and
cost-saving measures to streamline operations while providing optimal service to other
departments. There remain opportunities to encourage and support TSS’ role among state
departments to highlight the value TSS can provide as a shared services provider.
In its current state, TSS has not articulated a comprehensive performance framework across its
shared services functions that includes: 1) what is measured, 2) who is responsible for measuring
and reviewing performance, 3) how often performance is reviewed (monthly, quarterly, annually), and
4) what the escalation/remediation mechanisms include when performance is below expectations.
Examples of what metrics could include are as follows:
• Established timeframe to acknowledge and resolve escalations (similar to an IT Help Desk
Ticketing system, but for each shared service).
• Average turnaround timeframes for standard requests.
• Overall process duration (e.g., length of procurement, time to hire).
• Overall process outcomes.
• Number of Service Level Agreement breaches (assuming creation of service levels).
• Average time to remediate Service Level Agreement breaches (assuming creation of service
levels); and,
• Department satisfaction rates with TSS performance.
TSS confronts multiple barriers to the establishment of such a framework including:
• Timeframes not captured for all tasks performed today by TSS, making establishment of a
baseline difficult and requiring TSS to change processes and documentation to enable
capture of this data.
• Lack of access to data on certain processes that are partially centralized, where departments
have some responsibility and control (e.g., all procurements not captured by TSS, making it
challenging to assess average duration); and,
• Lack of consensus among cabinet-level departments on what metrics TSS should capture or
would be valuable to departments.
Without this data, TSS cannot demonstrate to other Arkansas departments how its current array of
shared services are performing. State agencies may be hesitant to avail themselves of shared
services over which they have less control and visibility and may instead opt to keep these functions
or services “in-house,” which can create inconsistencies and redundancies in services like IT
support.
Rationale: For all shared services, develop a performance framework that defines the customer
base, establishes success metrics, and tracks and mitigates underperformance to those metrics.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 23
This effort would not only increase transparency, but also build confidence among state agencies
that TSS can provide excellent services.
During field work, TSS completed a Performance Framework Strategic Compass, which can be
viewed below at Figure 8. As it highlights, the goal of developing a framework for shared services
performance is to increase/maintain customer satisfaction, facilitate continuous improvement,
increase/maintain employee morale, and quantify and convey the value of the services TSS provides.
This compass lays out the high-level process flow desired to reach the eventual end goal, along with
a few metrics for the process achievement.
In this future state, TSS shared services would have available a dashboard (such as one that could
be supported using a tool such as PowerBI or Tableau, or built using a proprietary tool) containing
metrics for each shared service area. The dashboard would show current performance (trended over
time, such as year-to-date) and include the agreed upon goal for each measure (e.g., 97% of Help
Desk tickets resolved in 48 hours). TSS would manage to the dashboard internally and share it
externally with partner departments on a regular frequency, such as monthly. TSS could establish the
practice that if a target is not met, the department includes an action plan to improve performance
in the following month. Using the example of the Help Desk above, if performance was 90%, TSS
would include analysis of the root cause of the issue and identify solutions such as a staff refresher
training and improvements to the routing and escalation processes as remedies. Annually, TSS can
review targets and adjust them to drive continuous improvement. For example, if in its baseline, TSS
found current performance for the Help Desk was that only 90% of tickets were closed in 48 hours, it
could establish a plan to improve performance over time, by changing the target each year.
TSS could begin to develop this framework today for the functions over which TSS already is offering
shared services and begin collecting some data in a pilot approach. By taking a piloted approach, a
tiered methodology to collect data, measuring performance, and reporting outcomes can be
implemented. For example, TSS can begin some of its Office of Personnel Management functions
and then expand into the new shared services functions such as Payroll. TSS also use Help Desk
tickets and how many are closed and resolved satisfactorily within a certain timeframe. This phased
approach allows TSS to implement an initial dashboard concept quickly, build buy-in, and
demonstrate value to its partner departments.
TSS can simultaneously or sequentially identify areas on which it would like to measure performance
and collect data moving forward. Part of the process will be identifying and acknowledging 1) where
TSS has no data or metrics; and 2) where performance data is available, but the agency is not doing
well (and develop a corresponding process improvement plan. KPIs will be critical to governance to
allow agencies some oversight into the functions of TSS, but these KPIs must be not only measured,
but utilized to drive performance improvement.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 24
Figure 8 – TSS Performance Framework Strategic Compass
Source: Work session with TSS staff on June 26, 2024.
TSS does not currently have all of the staff or resources required to successfully undertake the
initiatives related to centralization and shared services. TSS will need to establish performance
metrics for itself and develop a way to hold itself accountable and promote transparency for its
functions as an agency and as they related to shared services. This can demonstrate the department’s
willingness to hold itself accountable and improve.
TSS will need to develop a change management plan to cultivate a culture of customer service,
viewing the departments that they serve as customers or clients. When New Hampshire shifted to a
shared services model for IT under the Department of Information Technology (DoIT), the Chief
Information Officer credited his efforts at change management as being one of the most critical
aspects of their success. Previously, DoIT viewed other agencies as peers, but they needed to shift to
viewing them as customers, as their funding and structure depended upon other departments’
adopting, using, and being satisfied by their service (more detail is provided in the “Overview”
Section). TSS must similarly take an approach to providing other agencies with exceptional service,
demonstrating value through, for example, ease of use, streamlined service provision, timely support,
and process improvement.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 25
Figure 9 illustrates some of the barriers to success identified by staff in implementing a performance
framework for shared services. The barriers to achieving the goal are shown in red and solutions to
overcome them are shown in green.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 26
Figure 9 – Performance Framework Interference Diagram
Source: Work session with TSS staff on June 26, 2024.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 27
Strategies to address some of the most significant risks and enable success:
• Collaborate with other departments who have undergone the exercise of building
dashboards. For example, Arkansas Department of Agriculture (ADA) has identified creation
of internal and external dashboards among the highest priorities for the department. Under
the leadership of the Information Technology Team, the first generation of internal
management dashboards has been deployed for Plant Industries and is in process for the
Poultry and Livestock and Natural Resources divisions. The department is building these
dashboards with existing IT resources and deploying them through a web-based application.
Implementation is planned in phases; each department is establishing an initial dashboard
with available data. Staff manually collect and input metrics. Staff receive training on how to
add additional metrics. The second phase of the project will be to automate dashboard
production to reduce recurring staff data collection and reporting time. In the third phase,
division leaders will receive training in data visualization tools. It is anticipated that as the
department’s data acumen increases, leaders will adjust the metrics on their internal
dashboards, focusing the number of measures and identifying gaps in data not captured.
• Obtain buy-in and feedback from departments in the creation of a meaningful dashboard to
support shared services work.
• Establish quality control measures for data inputs, place higher priority on metrics
underpinned by the most reliable available data, train departmental employees on data
hygiene for most critical metrics to address the risk that data may not be consistent enough
to reliably track performance over time.
• Start with the shared services functions already established within TSS such as OPM and OSP
and evaluate organizational readiness to apply the performance framework. Next, consider
areas of performance monitoring/shared services not yet within the span of TSS
oversight/services.
Recommended steps developing a shared services performance framework (future state):
Phase 1: Pre-Action Steps
• ID staff to perform assessment: Identify skilled personnel with expertise in data analysis and
process evaluation to lead the assessment
• Collaborative process for developing metrics and targets: Facilitate workshops and working
groups involving stakeholders to ensure diverse perspectives in metric development
• Use findings to inform development of data collection and analysis capabilities for KPIs with
no established or consistent data (see below)
• Soft test metrics for a few measurement periods: Pilot test selected metrics over defined
periods to gauge feasibility and refine measurement methodologies.
• Use findings to inform development of data collection and analysis capabilities for KPIs with
no established or consistent data (see below).
Phase 2: Action Plan
• Conduct a current state assessment of shared services processes and performance
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 28
• Based on metrics identified in phase 1, review industry benchmarks and other state
performance to inform setting of the targets.
• Establish mechanisms for collection, based on current processes and IT systems: Set up
data collection mechanisms aligned with existing IT infrastructure and operational
processes.
o For KPIs with no established or consistent data, stand up capabilities to collect or
standardize data points. For example, TSS may implement a customer satisfaction
survey to collect data from the cabinet agencies it serves.
o Establish mechanisms for collection, based on current processes and IT systems:
Create new data collection protocols where necessary, integrating them into existing
workflows. Note that in the short-term, some metrics may need to be updated
manually, with a goal of long-term automation.
• Define other key aspects of a comprehensive performance framework including who is
responsible for measuring and reviewing performance, how often performance is reviewed
(monthly, quarterly, annually), and what the escalation/remediation mechanisms include
when performance is below expectations.
• Assess if existing data visualization tools will work to launch the dashboard, or explore
additional options. Consult with the Department of Agriculture about their internal and
external dashboard development as a low-/no-cost model of deploying a dashboard.
• Chargeback to Departments: Develop a chargeback mechanism to allocate costs associated
with data collection to relevant departments. This could be based on a standard allocation
calculated by dividing expenses based on head-count or PC count.
• Create and implement Dashboard/ Visualization Tools: Design and deploy a dashboard that
presents collected data in a user-friendly format.
o Implement necessary supporting technologies to track, analyze, and visualize KPIs.
• Design Process:
o Management assesses needed change: Engage management in the design process
to evaluate technological needs and potential changes.
• Pre-vetted “action thresholds”: Define predetermined thresholds that trigger proactive
responses based on KPI performance.
• Determine process and procedures for addressing performance deficiencies against KPIs
o If applicable, assign resources to develop training/train staff: Allocate resources for
training initiatives aimed at addressing performance gaps identified through KPI
analysis.
• Create a “lay person” data dictionary attached to dashboard with description: Include a user-
friendly data dictionary with clear definitions and explanations linked to the dashboard.
• Establish communication plan to convey changes and intended outcome: Develop a
comprehensive communication strategy to inform stakeholders about changes resulting
from performance assessments.
• Train staff on the new performance framework and reporting process.
• Measure employee morale and customer satisfaction on an ongoing basis: Implement
regular surveys to gauge employee morale and customer satisfaction in response to the new
performance framework.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 29
• Consult with leadership: Maintain ongoing dialogue with the Governor’s Office and
Legislative leaders to ensure alignment of performance metrics with organizational goals.
• External communication plan: Extend the communication plan to include external
stakeholders, fostering transparency and trust.
• Periodic review of the metrics: Schedule regular reviews of metrics to ensure relevance and
accuracy in measuring performance.
• Monitor ongoing impact of performance framework and adapt as necessary.
• Conduct regular assessments: Continuously evaluate the impact of the performance
framework through regular assessments and data analysis.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: TSS-9 is an
essential step in helping the State of Arkansas to mature its shared services model.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial TSS staff analysis
indicates that a dedicated project team with expertise in shared services and performance
management and additional external expertise as necessary will be required to implement this
initiative. In particular, an analytics and reporting resource who can own production of a
dashboard/scorecard is an important investment to support implementation of this initiative. In
addition, a data visualization tool, such as PowerBI or Tableau, will be required to track performance
metrics. TSS maintains existing contracts with both tools. In addition, based on requirements
gathered, TSS may be able to deploy a web-based tool, with internal resources, at no additional cost
(consult with Arkansas Department of Agriculture on its approach). No substantial cost is
anticipated.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: TSS and other agencies, including those not currently availing themselves of shared
services, will need to establish policies and procedures to effectively implement this initiative. A
change management plan is essential to outline, for example performance metrics and how TSS will
utilize the findings of the performance framework.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to increase and improve statewide shared services. Recommended
performance measures include:
• The overall establishment of departmental satisfaction with TSS services.
• Number of tracked performance metrics (tied to service levels); and,
• Total spending on shared services over time.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: This initiative is an enabler that will help TSS further centralize state
shared services and capture savings related to other initiatives; no savings are anticipated as a result
of this item.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across state agencies, state leadership, and with
citizens is critical to this initiative. As noted above in Figure 9, change management is vital to the
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 30
overall shared services strategies and establishment of a transparent performance framework
across all of TSS’ shared services. Further, creation of this dashboard will support the enhanced data
and business acumen of TSS and allow leadership to drive performance improvement by continuing
to set new goals for service delivery. This approach should include planning, frequent engagement
of the other cabinet-level departments, and a communication plan. Recommended messaging and
modalities are included for each audience in Figure 10. Key activities and timing for communication
plan are included in Appendix A – Work Plan.
Figure 10 – TSS-9 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
TSS internal staff, • TSS can improve its shared • Staff emails • Secretary
division leads; TSS services function and • TSS department Leslie Fisken
shared service leads demonstrate the effectiveness staff meetings
and efficiency of the agency’s • One-on-one
shared services offerings. meetings with key
• Our vision for shared services employees
is to treat our partner
departments as customers
and this data is an important
step in holding ourselves
accountable for performance.
• A performance framework is
being developed that will help
identify KPIs to measure
shared service performance;
first will need to identify what
data and authority we
currently have and what
staffing resources and IT will
be needed to successfully
implement.
• [Insert detail] on the metrics
being collected and process
for their selection.
Departmental • TSS is developing a • Leadership • Secretary
COOs/functional performance framework to meetings Leslie Fisken
department leadership enhance its ability to offer • Emails
shared services to the state of • Town hall style
Arkansas meeting
• TSS will be working with state
agency COOs/functional
departmental leadership to
involve them in developing the
framework, ensuring that
proper KPIs are identified and
that data offered will be
actionable and acted upon
when available
Governor’s Office • Performance framework will • Leadership • Secretary
need support from state meetings Leslie Fisken
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 31
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
leadership as well as agency
leadership in order to function
with the most benefit to the
state
Note: There are intentional placeholders for initiative owners to add more detail to the messages
once developed.
Initiative TSS #10 – Consolidate executive branch boards and
commissions
This initiative includes consolidating executive branch boards and commissions to streamline
decision governance and increase operational efficiency.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Across state government in Arkansas, there are
over 240 Boards and Commissions. 4 While these Boards and Commissions create outlets for
transparency and governance over particular aspects of state government, they also create
administrative cost to operate.
When TSS was established in 2019 following the passage of Act 910, known as the “Transformation
and Efficiencies Act” of the 92nd General Assembly, the department was created to create a more
efficient government through improved service delivery and collaboration across state government.
After its creation, TSS undertook a review of Boards and Commissions, asking each remaining
department to complete a report whose purposes were outlined as 1) prompting an analysis of the
Boards and Commissions in Departments and identifying efficiencies (cost savings) and
effectiveness (better results) opportunities, and 2) to propose and develop to deliver efficiency and
effectiveness improvements.
During this process, for example, TSS found within its own agency that the Land Survey Advisory
Board could be moved to the Arkansas Geographic Information Systems Board as the two share
similar duties. In Arkansas Department of Commerce (ACOM)’s report, TSS identified 23 boards,
commissions, and councils associated with the department. TSS recommended consolidating the
Arkansas Economic Development Commission bond guaranty program into the Arkansas
Development Finance Authority bond guaranty program and indicated that the potential for other
boards and commissions being consolidated were being explored.
Rationale: Based on this experience and the ongoing need, Initiative TSS-10 directs TSS to aid in
the consolidation of executive branch boards and commissions to streamline decision governance
and increase operational efficiency.
Texas’s Sunset Commission provides a potential model for determining the utility and continued
need for certain government executive bodies. The Sunset Commission evaluates agencies and
other state governmental bodies on a cyclical schedule to determine if they are still relevant. If so,
4
Office of the Governor, https://governor.arkansas.gov/online-services/join-the-administration/.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 32
Sunset recommends improvements to make them more effective and efficient. If not, Sunset
recommends abolishing the agency or transferring its functions to another agency with related
functions. A high-level overview of its process is provided below in Figure 11.
Figure 11 – Texas Sunset Commission Evaluation Process
Source: Reprinted from the Texas Sunset Commission.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success: TSS staff identified potential barriers to the
success of this initiative, which are shown in Figure 12. This chart is an interference diagram: it
summarizes the barriers or risks (shown in red) that may prevent TSS from achieving the goal of
consolidated Boards, and related solutions (shown in green).
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 33
Figure 12 – Boards Consolidation Interference Diagram
Source: Work session with TSS staff on June 25, 2024.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 34
• To address the barrier that many boards are subject matter specific, build a matrix of current
boards to include affiliated department, responsibilities, and necessary expertise and use
that to compare across departments to identify options for consolidation. Use the Arkansas
Department of Labor and Licensing (ADLL) as a pilot for consolidation.
• Collaborate closely with legal experts to ensure compliance with relevant laws and
regulations to address the risk that there will be legal and regulatory challenges in
consolidating boards and commissions.
• Develop a comprehensive change management plan that has support from key external
stakeholders and includes communication, training, and stakeholder engagement strategies
to address the risk that there will be substantial change management requirements
• Create a plan of conforming statutory changes to address the barrier that some boards are
required in and engage the Legislature to seek to amend rule and/or statute.
• To address the risk that there could be misunderstanding about the implication of “removing”
boards, conduct a public awareness campaign, create a matrix showing function and old vs.
new board responsibilities and publicize/remind stakeholders that rule changes require
public notice and allow for input.
• To address the risk that reducing Board size could reduce expertise to departments, use ADLL
as a pilot for consolidation, utilize SME members of one Board as the non-SME members of
another, and build a matrix of current boards at agencies, and necessary experience and use
that to compare across agencies.
• To address the risk that departments have different areas of focus, making consolidation
difficult: build a matrix of current boards at agencies, and necessary experience and use that
to compare across agencies, recognize it may not be feasible to execute cross-agency
consolidation in all instances.
• Potential for fee reductions: If the cost of regulation declines, the fees could be adjusted
proportionately.
Recommended steps consolidating boards and commissions (future state):
Phase 1: Pre-Action Steps
• Refine and finalize the criteria matrix that will be used to evaluate Boards and Commissions.
Consider the revenue collected by the licensure area if applicable, costs of regulation,
number of complaints/grievances, the policy matter under the purview of the Board and
Commission, the number of licenses renewed annually, among other variables.
• Distribute the matrix criteria to Department Project Managers to begin gathering necessary
information.
• Identify staff within departments responsible for managing Boards and Commissions.
• Clearly communicate the project goals and objectives to relevant departmental staff
involved in managing Boards and Commissions.
Phase 2: Action Plan
• Assemble “blue ribbon” task force:
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 35
o Compile a comprehensive list of all Boards and Commissions across departments,
liaising with Departmental Project Managers.
o Collaborate with stakeholders including Governor’s Office, Board members, and
Department Secretaries to assess roles, meeting schedules, authority sources,
recruitment challenges, and required expertise.
o Develop a matrix detailing the current status, responsibilities, legal frameworks, and
expertise requirements of each Board and Commission.
o Conduct interviews with members of Boards and Commissions to gather firsthand
insights into their operations and challenges.
• Implement Communications Plan re: agencies about work of the task force, goals for the
process.
• Establish scoring criteria for assessing boards and commissions, identify data inputs
needed to complete the review, solicit input and requisite data from department and
board/commission stakeholders to complete the review process.
o Define clear scoring criteria based on factors such as meeting frequency, essential
duties, unique contributions, legislative implications, and level of stakeholder
engagement.
• Solicit input and requisite data from Dept and Board/Commission to complete reviews
o Collect input and data from Departments and Boards/Commissions to finalize scores
based on the established criteria and initial hypotheses.
• Conduct full review of Boards/Commissions.
o Use established scoring criteria, collected data inputs, and a consensus decision
standard as determined by the task force.
• Update the Governor’s Office to share findings, get buy-in and support.
• Develop a consolidation plan, including recommendations for merging or eliminating boards
and commissions and outlining requisite legal implications of actions. This plan should
include the assessment and implementation implications of any mergers/eliminations and
the outline operational changes that will follow any Legislative action.
• Obtain requisite approvals from external stakeholders and implement the consolidation
plan.
• Identify legislative changes required and engage Legislature to draft necessary legislation.
• Implement communications plan regarding external stakeholders impacted.
• Consider implementation of recurring process to review function and design of existing
boards and commissions (akin to Texas Sunset Commission process) to ensure ongoing
efficiencies in the operation of the State’s boards and commissions.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: TSS has
previously conducted analysis and driven consolidation efforts of boards and commissions; this
initiative continues this work to ensure the modernization and cost-effectiveness of this structure.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial TSS staff analysis
indicates that a “Blue ribbon” task force dedicated to conducting board and commission review
process, legal and regulatory expertise will be necessary to implement this initiative. No IT resources
will be required and no substantial one-time costs are anticipated.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 36
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: Significant change management will be required to implement this initiative,
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to reduce spending and duplication across boards and commissions
across Arkansas state government. Recommended performance measures include:
• Number of executive branch boards and commissions;
• Fee reductions; and,
• Operational spending across administration of executive branch boards and commissions.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: TSS’ initial estimates are that this initiative could reduce annual recurring
expenditures by up to $6.3 million from the reduction in administrative costs associated with
maintaining boards and commissions (such as from reduced reimbursement costs for board and
commission members), however because the extent to which boards will be consolidated within this
or the next fiscal years is unknown, actually savings cannot be determined at this time. This cost
savings would be distributed across department budgets and not realized only at TSS.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across state departments, state leadership, and
with citizens and stakeholder organizations is critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and
modalities are included for each audience in Figure 13. Key activities and timing for communication
plan are included in Appendix A – TSS Work Plan.
Figure 13 – TSS-9 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Affected agency • Change management plan will • Agency emails • Courtney
staff/boards be put into place to • TSS department Traylor
communicate and educate on staff meeting
changes, hold trainings as • One-on-one
necessary meetings with
• Conduct a public awareness key employees
campaign, create a matrix
showing function and old vs.
new Board responsible for it;
publicize/remind stakeholders
that rule changes require
public notice
Governor’s Office and • Conduct a public awareness • Leadership • Courtney
Legislature campaign, create a matrix meetings Traylor
showing function and old vs. • Emails
new Board responsible for it; • Town hall style
publicize/remind stakeholders meeting
that rule changes require
public notice
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 37
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
• Legal review of all proposed
changes will be paramount to
process
External stakeholders • Conduct a public awareness • Public notice • Courtney
campaign, create a matrix • Posting on TSS Traylor
showing function and old vs. website
new Board responsible for it; • Notification on
publicize/remind stakeholders applicable
that rule changes require industry
public notice websites/email
listservs
Initiative TSS #11- Improve coordination among procurement roles across
the state
This initiative focuses on improving coordination among procurement roles across the state and
assessing opportunities for centralized reporting structures to create accountability across
departments, standardize common procurement activities, pool demand, and achieve lower total
cost of ownership. Procurement as a function is already largely centralized; the purpose of this
initiative is to help to TSS overcome non-compliance with these requirements and elevate the Office
of State Procurement to be a strategic division focused not only on management of individual
procurements, but to serve as a thought partner to departments to help them meet their needs in the
most effective manner.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The mission of the TSS Office of State
Procurement is “to serve and support the State and its citizens through effective, efficient, and
ethical procurement.” The Office of State Procurement (OSP) has primary responsibility and
oversight for the statewide procurement of commodities, technical, and professional services for all
state agencies, boards and commissions and colleges and universities. OSP also provides training in
Arkansas procurement laws, regulations, and policies.
Under A.C.A. § 19-11-217(c)(1), one of the duties of OSP is to procure or supervise the procurement
of commodities and services for each state agency not having an agency procurement official and,
when requested to do so by such an official, procure commodities and services not otherwise under
state contract.
The stated purposes of Arkansas Procurement Law are:
• Increased public confidence in the procedures followed in public procurement
• Fair and equitable treatment of all persons who deal with the procurement system of this
State
• Increased economy in State procurement activities by fostering effective competition
• Maintenance of a procurement system of quality and integrity.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 38
While Arkansas has centralized its procurement function within OSP, interviews and focus groups
conducted with staff indicate barriers to a comprehensive shared services or centralized contracting
function, including the following:
• Departmental compliance with existing policies varies.
• Departments craft their own RFPs and RFP standardization across agencies is lacking.
• Tracking of contract activity across the state is lacking.
• There is a lack of strategic focus in quality procurement, in part due to OSP not being included
in departmental procurement planning early enough and departments rushing the RFP
development process.
• Department procurement staff are not kept abreast of the most recently contracting resources
such as forms promulgated by OSP; and,
• Procurement expertise varies across departments.
While there are some examples of excellent collaboration with some agencies, OSP staff report that
many of the gaps above are due to a lack of “buy-in” and partnership from other state departments
in part due to a culture that views OSP as compliance-oriented and not as a resource, while others
stated that departments do not want to lose their autonomy in procurement. OSP sees itself as
“service minded” and eager to help departments complete solicitations correctly.
In addition, OSP believes it may not have the budget, technology, and staff resources to adequately
serve as an effective shared services partner or statewide procurement organization. Currently TSS
Procurement has only seven total Procurement Specialists (Buyers). If new service level
requirements were established regarding turnaround times for certain tasks or to increase
responsiveness, OSP would need to be staffed to deliver to those standards.
Staff and field work have highlighted that there are statutory and policy barriers to efficient and
effective state procurement as well. Some agencies such as DHS have specific statutory exceptions.
Statute also does not require certain contracts to be procured through a centralized state contract,
nor does it require documentation or any approval to opt out of contracts that would be best procured
centrally.
Rationale: By improving coordination among procurement roles across the state and assessing
opportunities for centralized reporting structures, OSP has the potential to create accountability
across departments, standardize common procurement activities, pool demand, and achieve lower
total cost of ownership. While coordination of procurement roles can create accountability across
departments, standardize common procurement activities, pool demand, and achieve lower total
cost of ownership, there are multiple hurdles currently to OSP and the State of Arkansas achieving
these goals, including not only technical limitations like insufficient data and tracking and statutory
barriers, but also, inter-departmental culture and the need to re-frame the role of OSP and
centralization in the procurement landscape.
Based on a review of Arkansas’s existing contracts and an assessment against peer state and private
sector procurement practices, Arkansas may realize a $140-230M savings opportunity by making a
series of changes to its procurement practices, centered on three priorities — getting the “right stuff”,
at the “right (total) price”, through the “right processes”. The target “future state” for state
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 39
procurement capabilities is centered on five fundamental design principles, which represent the
strategic priorities of the organization. Each procurement initiative will improve Arkansas’s
procurement function with respect to one or more of these design principles: 1) efficiency and speed,
2) user experience, 3) thought partnership, 4) analytical foundation, and 5) value. See more in
“ARKANSAS FORWARD: STRATEGIC PROCUREMENT PLAN.”
The future state vision for Arkansas Forward procurement team is that OSP will serve as a resource
to other departments, not only in managing the procurement process but in advising them on how to
best meet their needs (such as with a vendor). OSP has a crucial role to play in the coordination of
procurement staff to assess the current procurement landscape, identify key areas for improvement
through coordination/centralization, develop a method to track outcomes of the improved
procurement system, and manage the change in culture, policies, and procedures that undertaken
the future state vision will involve. As a current training resource for procurement staff, OSP can
facilitate achievement of these workforce goals by consolidating and reviewing existing trainings and
evaluating opportunities for improvement, increased consistency, and alignment.
Georgia provides one potential model for improved statewide contracting. Georgia’s State
Purchasing Division (SPD) establishes statewide contracts with one goal: “to maximize savings for
the benefits of state and local government entities while still providing high-quality products and
services without hassle or extra costs.” The State of Georgia has an order of precedence for
purchasing goods and services that is established by SPD. 5 To comply with state procurement laws,
agencies must purchase goods and services based on four predetermined tiers. These four tiers are:
• Tier One: Mandatory Statewide Contracts—Agencies must use these contracts unless SPD
grant a waiver.
• Tier Two: Existing Agency Contracts—If the goods or services an agency is seeking are not
available in tier one, the agency must use contracts in tier two. If what is needed to purchase
is not available within these contracts and an agency needs to deviate from them, the state
employee must get documented approval by the employee’s Agency Procurement Officer
(APO).
• Tier Three: Statutory Sources Designated as Mandatory—State entities are required by
statute to purchase certain products and services from the Georgia Correctional Industries
Administration (GCI) and Georgia Enterprises for Products and Services (GEPS).
• Tier Four: Other Sources—If a state employee or the APO cannot purchase what is needed
using Tier 1, 2, or 3, then the department may pursue any of the options available in Tier 4.
This tier consists of convenience statewide contracts, GEPS preferred products, SPD
approved piggyback purchases, cooperative purchasing following public notice, and open
market purchases.
Agencies are directed to ask three questions when needing to purchase a good or service:
1. Is the good or service that you need exempt from the State Purchasing Act?
2. Can the goods or services be purchased using an existing contract or established and
approved source?
3. Is special approval necessary?
5
Georgia Department of Administrative Services, “Overview,” https://doas.ga.gov/state-purchasing/order-
precedence/overview.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 40
The Georgia model is a mix of centralized and decentralized procurement; a strong central
procurement department supports certain functions managed within agencies. This model may have
elements that are applicable in Arkansas, leveraging the procurement expertise of OSP and the
subject matter knowledge of the department procurement staff.
As outlined in the Strategic Procurement Plan, Arkansas’ future state procurement organization will
be centrally managed by OSP with department-led execution and input. OSP will provide overall
direction and support throughout the procurement process, but activities will be executed at the
department level. OSP will maintain training and standards for the procurement function and
manage cross-functional interactions with support functions. OSP can coordinate this effort, as
acknowledged in the Arkansas Forward: Strategic Procurement Plan by organizing procurement
functions as follows below in Figure 14.
Figure 14 – Strategic Procurement Plan Procurement Function Organization
Source: McKinsey & Company.
Departments will partner with OSP throughout the procurement process and elicit support and
insight from DFA and other supporting organizations, where needed. Collaboration of procurement
professionals and supporting organizations will be fostered through regular cross-functional
meetings and communications. These delineations and opportunity for partnership and
collaboration can help aid in adoption of more centralized contracts.
Establishing metrics: To address change management concerns, OSP must work to establish trust
and buy-in by demonstrating its value and commitment to be a service partner. One best practice
would be to establish service levels clearly outlining the roles and responsibilities of OSP and other
departments for procurement functions and attaching performance metrics to these roles to monitor
how each partner’s functions are being undertaken. OSP can not only demonstrate value through
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 41
excellence performance, but it can build trust by acknowledging areas where it may not be collecting
enough data or performing adequately and can work to address these deficiencies. For example, if
OSP wants to be relied upon as a resource with RFP development, OSP needs to establish early
benchmarking and standards for itself. Texas’ Statewide Procurement function within the Texas
Comptroller’s Office has a Procurement Oversight and Delegation (POD) team, which reviews
solicitations and delegates purchasing authority for service contracts with a value of over
$100,000. The division establishes on its website that individuals must allow for a 30-day review
period once the complete solicitation package is submitted. OSP can similarly establish timelines
for itself that are publicly shared and then monitor its ability to meet this metric.
Metrics and service levels can also help establish what level of staffing OSP needs to properly
support the procurement function it wishes to fulfill, whether it is obtained by moving procurement
staff from agencies, centralizing procurement functions but embedding staff within agencies, or
hiring new staff within OSP.
Change management coordination: OSP must play a coordinating role in ensuring change
management is successfully implemented through the following best practice behaviors as
identified in Arkansas Forward’s Strategic Procurement Plan. This includes not only a
communications plan that successfully frames the undertaking of this initiative and its relationship
to the large Arkansas Forward Procurement Strategy, but also a plan for implementing this initiative
in terms of the roll out, scale, and timing.
OSP will need to consider its internal staffing capabilities, physical space, data/software
capabilities, and how more coordinated procurement functions will affect agency operations. A
phased approach to centralization could help ease the transition, beginning with improving
coordination with procurement staff at agencies that already do some centralized procurement.
Determining opportunities for more coordination, analyzing data availability, and establishing
service levels with these partners has the best opportunity for a successful beginning that can kick
start momentum and develop buy-in. Following this effort, a pilot with a different agency, or bringing
in new categories of contracts can be pursued. OSP can also determine at this juncture what form
improved coordination should take: a model where procurement staff from agencies are brought in-
house to OSP and their roles eliminated within their respective agencies, a model where instead OSP
embeds its own staff as liaisons within agencies to enhance coordination, etc. This phased approach
also enables OSP to identify the statutory, policy, or technical barriers that could impede expansion
of the centralization effort.
Throughout, a detailed communication plan is critical. Procurement staff will want to know how it
impacts them at a personal level and whether they will lose their position or be re-allocated to a
different function, and fears of losing subject matter expertise may also present a speedbump. OSP
should focus on emphasizing that it is working in tandem with department staff and not against them,
seeking to be a partner in improving state contracting and getting the best value for the state. Another
key message is that coordination improves efficiency: instead of departmental staff only able to
focus part-time on contracting efficiencies, centralized procurement creates staff resources that can
work on standardization of process, which improves predictability of outcomes.
Leadership support for this change will be necessary, including messaging the benefits of
coordination. Finally, OSP must reinforce that the transition to increased centralization will be
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 42
iterative and done collaborative with agency staff, with continuous evaluation of the transition to
learn and improve during process.
Customer Service: Moving from being viewed as a compliance-focused agency to a partner and
resource will also require strategy and concerted focus. With a renewed focus on demonstrating
value, OSP can also demonstrate service and improve its standing with departments by re-framing
its focus as being a “customer-centric” centralized resource for procurement and not an
enforcement entity.
New Hampshire provides a potential model for successful centralization change management after
its Department of Information (DoIT) underwent IT centralization nearly 20 years ago. In the years
after centralization occurred, a culture shift occurred to support a shared services model, wherein
DoIT began to view other agencies it served not as peer-agencies, but as customers. DoIT adopted
more of a business-mindset. The CIOs at each agency became chief relationship managers with
DoIT, and much of the CIO’s role is managing and tending to these relationships and relations with
state leadership.
OSP can similarly promote its contracting expertise, negotiation skills, training capacity, future state
data capabilities, and centralized contract function as valuable resources for other departments to
use. OSP is positioning itself as a partner to achieve the most efficient and favorable terms for the
state.
Data Resources: OSP as envisioned in the Arkansas Forward Strategic Procurement Plan will be
responsible for the central management and execution of Arkansas’s procurement analytics
capabilities, owning the database management and data governance sub-functions. OSP’s role in
this can take an analytical focus, launching comprehensive procurement analytics tools, and
standardizing data rules across departments to allow for a holistic view of procurement spend and
performance. For example, OSP will set standards on vendor performance and work with
departments to collect data on how vendors are tracked relative to Service Level Agreements. The
departments will then leverage this data, which is easily accessible through an analytical platform
(Arriba) to track vendor performance and intercede with vendors/suppliers as needed to ensure
contracted terms and service levels are being met.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Promote understanding of existing policy and OSP functionality through a departmental
“roadshow.” The goals of this initiative would be to increase the number of departments
engaging OSP for their procurements and ensuring departments engage OSP earlier in their
process. See FUNC-25 for a detailed discussion of implementation.
• Build support from departmental leadership through implementation of a
dashboard/scorecard with service level performance (See TSS-9). An example metrics that
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 43
could be used include overall time to award (from initiation of RFP) and turnaround times for
acknowledgement and completion of individual process steps by OSP staff.
• Cultivate a culture of customer service at OSP to build buy-in of partner departments. OSP
can make customer service come alive by adopting core customer values, recognizing and
rewarding staff who live by the values (low and no-cost methods could include a monthly
breakfast with leadership, bestowing a physical award or certificate, recognizing staff in all-
staff email newsletter and at town halls, providing staff with physical objects that include the
values such as lanyards or mousepads, and sharing success stories/videos/vignettes with
staff), and using ongoing leadership modelling of these values.
Recommended steps for implementing coordinated procurement (future state):
• Conduct a detailed current state assessment of procurement processes, performance, and
organizational structure (complete).
• Conduct an analysis of staff expertise in contract negotiation, particularly for IT contracts,
and identify any staffing or consulting needs to enhance the team.
• Conduct statewide analysis of existing contracts, standardize categorization to enable
analysis, with leadership support.
• Identify key areas for improvement and define solution set of coordination/centralization
alternatives (position movement, reporting hierarchies, process steps, and decision-making
authority). If any gaps in existing authority are identified, and work with the Governor’s Office
and Legislature to address.
• With data on statewide contracts collected, complete analysis of current workload, identify
OSP staffing needs (to transfer from other departments), and tie to service levels.
• Develop proposal for enhanced OSP team; syndicate changes with TSS, departmental, and
external stakeholders and receive necessary approvals.
• Implement performance metric tracking as part of shared services dashboard, using data
visualization tool.
• Develop best practices toolkit for complex contract negotiation, with internal staff and
consultant support.
• Train OSP team on new procedures, contract negotiation best practices, and customer
service to support engagement and buy-in with other departments.
• Monitor ongoing impact of coordination and centralization approach, collect feedback from
impacted departments who receive services from OSP, and adapt as necessary.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: OSP is
committed to “effective, efficient, and ethical procurement.” From the inception of TSS, OSP was
envisioned as the statewide procurement entity to improve contracting through leveraging the state’s
buying power, improving coordination, and eliminating duplication and inconsistency. Implementing
this initiative is aligned with current department priorities, staffing, and resources.
See Arkansas Forward’s Procurement vision, TSS Overview, FUNC-11, FUNC-4, FUNC-73, TSS-30,
TSS-13, TSS-9, FUNC-25, FUNC-27 for other procurement initiatives that support these efforts to
coordinate procurement activities and strengthen the state’s procurement organization.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 44
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial TSS staff analysis
indicates that procurement leadership with expertise in coordination and reporting structures will be
necessary to implement this initiative, as well as IT systems to track performance metrics (e.g.,
PowerBI or Tableau). TSS currently has enterprise contracts in place with both vendors. To the extent
existing licenses can be utilized, significant cost is not anticipated. Depending on the total volume of
procurements anticipated to involve OSP, OSP may require additional staff transfers. The size of the
staffing need is unknown without more comprehensive data on total volme and agreement on
expected service levels.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: TSS and other state agency procurement leadership will need to establish policies and
procedures to effectively implement this initiative. A change management plan is essential to outline,
for example, roles, responsibilities, and performance metrics.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to improve statewide procurement functions, therefore saving the state
by leveraging its purchase power to obtain competitive or bulk pricing and eliminate redundancies
and inconsistencies. Recommended performance measures include:
• Total procured spend over time.
• Cost savings/avoidance captured through central supports (mandatory statewide contracts).
• Cost/unit variance (compared to benchmarked market pricing).
• Number of statewide contracts.
• Number of inquiries from departments to OSP.
• Turnaround time on inquiries; and,
• Total time to award.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: No potential savings were identified in relation to this initiative. This
initiative could enable savings through other initiatives.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across OSP, state procurement leadership, and
the state leadership is critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are
included for each audience in Figure 15. Key activities and timing for communication plan are
included in Appendix A – Work Plan.
Figure 15 – FUNC-4 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
TSS/OSP • OSP undertaking joint effort • Agency emails • Jessica
with state agency • OSP staff Patterson
procurement entities to meeting • Tanya
increase efficiency of state Freeman
• Meetings with
purchasing managers
• Buy-in and collaboration with
procurement leads from other
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 45
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
agencies will be crucial to the
success of this undertaking
• OSP and TSS are focused on
providing meaningful
statewide shared services and
focus of procurement
coordination will be
establishing service levels and
holding ourselves to these
levels and identifying where
we can better serve
departments as our
“customers”
Agency procurement • The state needs an enterprise- • Leadership • Jessica
leads/staff level collaboration on meetings Patterson
coordinating procurement • Emails • Tanya
roles across the state to Freeman
• Town hall style
optimize state contracting meeting
• OSP is positioned as a • Update
resource, not taking away Procurement
proper contracting authority. Manual to reflect
Wants to demonstrate its changes
value to state departments
and is developing KPIs to help
tell this story and show
benefits and where state can
improve
• OSP needs the support of
Department leadership and
procurement staff, and needs
their partnership to make this
large-scale effort a success for
Arkansas
• Cost savings and efficiencies
projected from successfully
implementing this initiative
will place Arkansas among
best in class for procurement
in the nation
•
State leadership • OSP undertaking an • Leadership • Jessica
(Governor’s Office, enterprise-level collaboration meetings Patterson
on coordinating procurement • Meetings with • Tanya
Legislature) Freeman
roles across the state Legislature
• OSP needs the support of the • One-on-one
Governor’s Office and meetings
Legislature and needs their
partnership to make this large-
scale effort a success for
Arkansas
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 46
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
• Cost savings and efficiencies
projected from successfully
implementing this initiative
will place Arkansas among
best in class for procurement
in the nation
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 47
Initiative TSS #12 - Improve coordination among HR roles across the state
This initiative focuses on improving coordination among HR roles across the state and assessing
opportunities for centralized reporting structures to create accountability across departments,
standardize common human resources activities, make employee experience more consistent
across the state, and disseminate best practices for increased efficiency. Based on direction from
the Arkansas Forward Steering Committee, the initial step for this implementation is to transfer the
payroll processing function to TSS, with the intent of expanding this centralization to include
additional functions upon demonstration of success.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Office of Personnel Management (OPM)
administers the state’s personnel system and establishes necessary policies and procedures to
ensure system uniformity under state and federal laws. OPM provides for the efficient utilization of
state resources and the effective management of Classification and Compensation, Payroll, and
Training. Today, OPM’s functions and authority are among the most centralized in terms of Arkansas’
vision for shared services. OPM’s roles and responsibilities include the following:
• Establishes job classifications, including job duties and minimum requirements to perform
each job, as well as the statewide pay scale
• Manages payroll system and ensures that all state employees are timely paid.
• Establishes and maintains the statewide performance evaluation system.
• Develops catalog of training courses for employee development and job performance; and,
• Manages programs such as grievance procedure, catastrophic leave, and employee
suggestions.
Arkansas Forward has highlighted opportunities for increased centralization and standardization of
human resources functions. Under the state’s current organization, certain human resource
functions are still decentralized within each department, leading to duplication and lack of
consistency. Human resources managers can access their own department data, but not statewide,
which hinders appropriate resourcing and evaluation. Inefficiencies exist for processes like payroll,
orientation, onboarding, training, and recruiting. For example, departmental staffing levels are
inconsistent or inefficient in some instances, leading to increased costs. Staff may not be dedicated
fully to human resources, which prevents their specialization in and focus on these functions. In
addition, it is not fully known how many employees are working on payroll, though estimates have
been developed based on interviews with a sample of departments. Statewide, consistent training
and onboarding would also be a gain for the state. While recruiting, departments are focused on their
own needs and not on what other departments are looking for; centralization means the entire state
might have a larger talent pool from which to select employees.
Based on analysis of the overall state HR footprint (range of 337-431 staff across all departments)
and the assumption that a range of 103-196 staff are HR generalists who would remain within the
departments where they are located, it is estimated that 141-328 staff could be transferred to TSS
over time if the State centralized every sub-function of HR and assigned TSS responsibility for
these functions.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 48
Despite the potential efficiency gains from centralization, OPM staff indicate significant change
management is needed to support greater centralization of human resources functions, given the
preference departments have for their own autonomy.
Rationale: By helping Arkansas to realize the vision of more centralized human resources
functions, OPM will support greater quality and standardization across common human resources
activities and processes (payroll, recruiting/hiring, onboarding, etc.), improve statewide workforce
planning and addressing critical workforce needs (such as addressing use of contractors FUNC-82),
and improve and make more consistent the employee experience.
OPM staff should delineate roles and responsibilities, which outline what HR functions are
centralized and what functions should remain at each agency. OPM would maintain an inventory of
each agency’s HR staff and responsibilities. While there are no formal service level expectations at
for OPM’s central human resource functions, a focus would be on reducing duplication, having fewer
handoffs, and creating consistency, which should improve the cycle time of many HR functions:
faster hiring, better, more consistently trained staff, and a better feedback loop. OPM can coordinate
this effort, as acknowledged in the Arkansas Forward: Strategic Human Resources Plan by organizing
HR functions as follows below in Figure 16.
Figure 16 – Strategic Human Resources Plan HR Function Organization
Source: McKinsey & Company.
Implementation Considerations:
This initiative includes two key areas, which are addressed through the recommendations:
• Short-term actions to move certain functions such as payroll to OPM; and,
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 49
• Longer-term planning for the transfer of additional functions.
Other State Experience
Indiana
In 2005, the Indiana State Personnel Department (SPD), under newly elected Governor Mitch
Daniels, was tasked with several large initiatives to improve the effectiveness of several human
resources (HR) functions embedded within state agencies. During this process, Indiana also
centralized Performance Management, Strategic Hiring and Position Management, Talent
Acquisition, Benefits and Healthcare, among other functions.
Prior to 2005, most Indiana state agencies possessed their own human resources staff resulting in
information provided to employees, hiring processes, compensation and other HR functions varying
greatly. This variability from agency to agency lead to inconsistent outcomes and application of
policy. SPD saw the opportunity to improve accuracy, eliminate redundancy of services, and gain
efficiency overall by centralizing HR functions throughout the executive branch of state government.
SPD conducted an evaluation to determine positions and services that could be centralized,
resulting in an “HR centralization roadmap.” This roadmap was utilized to systematically transition
from a decentralized to a centralized model for HR delivery.
As part of this centralization process, Indiana SPD conducted an analysis of staffing ratios to
determine the optimal level of HR support for each state agency, with adjustments made to
accommodate field offices, mainly in 24/7 operations. SPD developed staffing projections for
agencies and created appropriate HR job classifications to achieve standardization across agencies.
Under the Indiana model, there is typically one or more embedded SPD HR resource with centralized
agencies, but most HR needs are provided by the SPD central office staff. As a result of centralization,
agencies receive HR services in the following disciplines: Benefits, Compensation, Organizational
Design, Employee Relations, Disability Act Compliance, Performance Management, Training and
Development, Employee Data, Talent Acquisition, Employment, Communications and Human
Resources Management Systems.
Florida
The Florida “Service First Initiative,” was implemented in the early 2000 as part of a shared services
initiative to consolidate and outsource human resources operations among the executive branch agencies
to a single HR vendor. Overall, the Service First initiative and HR outsourcing were driven by a combination
of economic, technological, and political factors, with the overarching goal of transforming state
government operations to better serve the needs of Floridians by using enhanced technology and more
efficient HR service for transactional operations. Florida hoped to benefit from the specialized skills and
advanced technologies of private HR service providers, leading to more efficient and effective HR
operations.
While the outsourcing component is not contemplated by Arkansas, there may be some lessons learned
from the centralization portion of this initiative. While the project aimed to improve efficiency and reduce
costs in state government operations, its implementation faced several challenges ranging from employee
morale, service quality, contract management, technology integration, and stakeholder criticisms. Some
of the lessons learned included:
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 50
• A need to perform more change management and readiness planning, instead of a focus on
traditional project management. The size of the contract and impact of the change brought
significant external and media scrutiny.
• Because of the pace of the implementation and the lack of knowledge in managing large scale
implementations of this nature, the data migration and system integration were more complex
and problematic than expected and that is something that could have been better planned.
• There was a need for more state employee staff training and skill development related to the new
technology and processes, which would have supported adaptation to the new system. The level
of complexity was greater than expected.
• There was a need for more robust communications with leaders. Some examples of effective tools
that were used in later implementations were scripts for leaders, communication packets,
timelines for leaders on when messaging was going to be distributed, info sessions, and town halls.
• It is important to consider the “change readiness” of the organizational culture and its history with
implementing large-scale changes. Conservatively, one should assume low change readiness and
plan for it accordingly.
Change Management
Change management will need to include involvement of TSS leadership from the outset, with an
emphasis that all consolidation will involve input from department leadership and that their support
is paramount to the effort. Additionally, communication needs to emphasize that OPM will not
operate centralized functions in a vacuum, but that each department still will have dedicated points
of contact within OPM to reach if they need assistance with an issue or have a question, and that they
know this person will answer their call or call them back promptly to resolve any issues. A process
for feedback will be critical so departments can provide input and feel their voices and experiences
are valued as centralization occurs. Department leadership will need to get facetime with OPM and
even TSS leadership so that complaints can be escalated and resolved appropriately and promptly.
OPM should also communicate that human resources staff will be involved in developing best
practice processes and procedures to minimize culture shock and potentially migrate certain
practices that show promise. For example, when DHS moved to its internal shared services model,
it adopted a practice in which evaluations with new staff involve the employee’s former leadership,
so that input can occur even after an employee migrates to a new role. OPM can help establish buy-
in by highlighting a culture of customer service and creating a scorecard or report card to share its
performance.
Considerations for Short-Term Transfer of Staff (e.g., Payroll):
• OPM will require existing departmental human resources staff to migrate to the department
to accomplish this initiative (anticipated to be phased as additional functions are
centralized). OPM may consider whether leaving staff physically collocated within the
departments offers advantages in terms of customer service or if moving the staff to TSS is
preferred due to the opportunity for better team cohesion, skill building, and management.
• OPM will need to meet with each department to negotiate which positions and budget
authority will transfer to TSS and whether existing staff will also transfer. A negotiation
process with department involving human resource roles should consider how many
positions are necessary to conduct remaining decentralized human resources. Some
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 51
departments are using multiple staff in a part-time capacity to perform human resources
functions, so the transfer of all staff would not be appropriate.
• An assessment of the skills and knowledge of people who are identified will need to take
place to determine new roles and establish training plans to standardize performance and
elevate the quality of the work.
• TSS will need to develop organizational charts for functions moving to OPM oversight. This
includes determining a manager to staff ratio and determining managerial span.
Considerations for Longer-Term Planning and Transfer of Additional Functions:
Through Arkansas Forward, human resources functions have been identified and assessed to
identify if they would benefit from centralization. Ultimately all functions were identified for transfer
to OPM except employee relations, which would remain within each department. Planning for the
sequencing of additional functions is needed, as well as the criteria or “stage gates” for OPM to reach
to gain the confidence of leadership and peer departments that the division is ready to assume
additional functions.
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Develop a clear communication plan and strategies to avoid significant turnover among
directly impacted human resources staff. Investing in team building and training resources to
support new team leads once staff transferring to TSS, to help the teams form and to
strengthen sense of belonging by new staff. This will be particularly important if staff remain
physically located in their former buildings in the short term.
• Cultivate a culture of customer service at OPM, to earn the support and buy-in of partner
departments. OPM can make customer service come alive by adopting core customer
values, recognizing and rewarding staff who live by the values (low and no-cost methods
could include a monthly breakfast with leadership, bestowing a physical award or certificate,
recognizing staff in all-staff email newsletter and at town halls, providing staff with physical
objects that include the values such as lanyards or mousepads, and sharing success
stories/videos/vignettes with staff), and using ongoing leadership modelling of these values.
• Establish clear communication and escalation protocols to ensure departmental customers
(secretaries, other leaders, human resources leaders) understand how to engage with OPM
and escalate issues as needed.
• Monitor the implementation through strategies including one-on-one check-ins with
departmental leaders and surveys and involve key stakeholders from the initiative outset to
reduce risk that cross-departmental stakeholders may not understand or follow new
processes/centralization measures. There may be operational challenges in the
consolidation, but TSS’ willingness to accept and address feedback will be important.
Because payroll has been identified as the first functional area to centralize at OPM, specific
recommended steps for implementation include:
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 52
• Engage in individual meetings with each department to discuss the number of positions to
transfer to OPM (including whether the staff will move with the positions or remain in the
departments).
• Establish ongoing cadence of meetings with departments to update on the progress of
implementation and create a feedback mechanism to inform further centralization of human
resources functions.
• Develop a new organization chart under existing management team to accommodate the
new payroll staff (identifying any gaps in positions or leadership and posting for those
positions as needed).
• Assess the skills of new staff and develop training plan.
• Develop or procure resources for new managers (including supervisors) at TSS such as team-
building activities and training for newly formed teams (state may consider contracting with
an entity to facilitate sessions for each new team on becoming a high performing team and
learning to work together and communicate effectively, given different personalities and
styles).
• Review current payroll process using existing policies and procedures with a small group of
transferring staff and existing OPM staff.
• Revise process to reflect any process improvements used within individual departments.
• Develop job aids and refresher training to ensure consistent application of process across all
new staff.
• Conduct shadowing of new employees as a quality control strategy.
• Identify key performance measures related to payroll processing for use in establishing
service levels/targets.
• Create a dashboard to monitor payroll processing metrics (and share them as part of TSS
dashboard/scorecard).
• Train payroll staff on customer service best practices to help instill change management
around serving the needs of other departments.
• Establish survey for department leaders and human resources professionals to monitor their
experience during the transition; and,
• Monitor ongoing impact of coordination/centralization and adapt as necessary.
Recommended steps for implementing additional centralization among HR roles (future state):
• Review and revise the work plan for each transferring function, based on the steps outlined
above for the payroll transfer.
• Adapt the approach based on lessons learned from other functions.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: OPM is charged
with the efficient utilization of state resources and the effective management of Classification and
Compensation, Payroll, and Training. Implementing this initiative is aligned with current department
priorities, staffing, and resources; however, it is crucial to consider that augmented staffing and IT
resources will be necessary.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 53
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial TSS staff analysis
indicates that HR leadership with expertise in coordination and reporting structures and IT Systems
to track performance metrics (e.g., PowerBI or Tableau) will be required to implement this initiative.
TSS has already negotiated an enterprise agreement with these vendors.
Enablers for success if centralized:
• Need new cloud-based IT system – existing SAP system is heavily customized to prevent
efforts – when tried to move to Success Factors, didn’t work well due to decentralization
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: OPM staff will review policies for each functional area contemplated for further
centralization. It is not anticipated that statewide payroll rules will change, but TSS will need to revise
staff job aids and manuals to reflect new duties performed within TSS. A change management plan
is essential to outline, for example, roles, responsibilities, and performance metrics.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to improve statewide human resources functions, leading to efficiencies
in related operations. As functions are centralized, metrics relevant to those functions should be
adopted (e.g., if payroll is centralized, start with metrics relevant to that function):
• Payroll error incidences (expected to decrease);
• Total onboarding and offboarding costs (expected to decrease); and,
• Average vacancy to onboarding time (expected to decrease).
Initial priority should be to identify payroll-related metrics for use in establishing departmental
service levels (see TSS-9). OPM may consider using timeliness and accuracy metrics for payroll
processing.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: Potential savings will be enabled by the further centralization of human
resources functions.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across OPM, state HR leadership, and state
leadership is critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are included for each
audience in Figure 17. Key activities and timing for communication plan are included in Appendix A
– TSS Work Plan.
Figure 17 – TSS-12 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Department Leads • OPM is seeking to improve • Department • Kay Barnhill
efficiencies in state leadership
government by reducing meetings
duplication of roles and (Secretary and
inconsistencies in state Chief of Staff)
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 54
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
government operations
related to human resources.
• There are benefits to state and
departmental-level
functioning by reducing
duplication as seen in other
states.
• Some staff will transfer to
OPM as functions transfer to
OPM.
• OPM will work collaboratively
and in partnership with
departments to identify
efficiencies and develop a
transition plan.
• OPM wants departments to
share in the benefits of this
streamlining and support
agencies gaining efficiencies
through allowing department
resources to focus on agency-
specific workloads, not
repetitive or duplicative HR
functions.
• Discuss assigned resources,
chain of command, points of
contact, and escalation
protocols [insert].
• Service level metrics will be
established to build
accountability and
transparency during this
transition [insert specific
service levels established].
Department human • OPM is seeking to improve • Meetings with • Kay Barnhill
resources staff efficiencies in state Human
government by reducing Resources
duplication of roles and managers.
inconsistencies in state • Town hall style
government operations related meeting with HR
staff.
to human resources.
• There are benefits to state and
agency-level functioning by
reducing duplication as seen
in other states.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 55
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
• Some staff will be transferring
to OPM. OPM will work
collaboratively with human
resources staff to identify
opportunities and negotiate
positions and workload—this
is not a reduction in force
effort but there may be
reconfiguration of roles and
responsibilities.
• Discuss assigned resources,
chain of command, points of
contact, and escalation
protocols [insert].
• Service level metrics will be
established to build
accountability and
transparency during this
transition [insert specific
service levels established]
State leadership • OPM is assuming greater • Leadership • Kay Barnhill
(Governor’s Office, responsibilities as part of its meetings
Legislature) statewide shared services • Meetings with
model Legislature
• There are benefits to state and • One-on-one
department -level functioning meetings
by reducing duplication as
seen in other states
• OPM requests the support of
the Governor’s Office and
Legislature to make this large-
scale effort a success for
Arkansas
• Service level metrics will be
established to build
accountability and
transparency during this
transition [insert specific
service levels established]
Note: There are intentional placeholders for initiative owners to add more detail to the messages
once developed.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 56
Initiative TSS #13 - Improve coordination among IT roles across the state
This initiative includes improving coordination among IT roles across the state and assessing
opportunities for centralized reporting structures to create accountability across departments,
standardize common IT activities, consolidate IT systems and licenses, and create more consistency
in cybersecurity and data governance practices. Based on direction from the Arkansas Forward
Steering Committee, the initial step for this implementation is to transfer Help Desk functionality to
TSS, with the intent of expanding this centralization to include additional functions upon
demonstration of success.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Despite the efforts to maintain a centralized IT
function, DIS faces barriers to most efficiently and effectively provide enterprise-wide services.
Analysis conducted during Arkansas Forward and highlighted in the Arkansas Forward Strategic IT
Plan shows that Arkansas’ large IT projects are distributed across departments, with limited formal
project governance processes linking DIS, department CIOs, and operating leaders to track results
and overcome implementation barriers. From a procurement perspective, Arkansas faces long
approval cycle times for large orders, limited resources to actively manage vendors within
departments, and missed opportunities to increase buying power state-wide and reduce rates.
This lack of coordination leads to duplication, delays, and inefficiencies, which challenge the notion
that centralized IT functions can be a value-add to individual departments.
Rationale: By improving coordination among IT roles across the state and assessing opportunities
for centralized reporting structures, DIS can create accountability across departments, standardize
common IT activities, consolidate IT systems and licenses, and create more consistency in
cybersecurity and data governance practices. Further, through increased coordination of IT roles,
better service to state agencies can reduce service disruptions.
Arkansas Forward benchmarking revealed that with greater visibility into project contract spend, DIS
will be able to consistently and centrally track performance metrics, such as status, schedules, risks,
and budget overages. Standardized and improved governance has the potential to unlock 10-20%
savings across the state (i.e., up to $45M in savings per year) based on similar efforts in other
organizations.
Other highlights from the Arkansas Forward Strategic IT Plan highlights that will flow from
coordinated IT functions include:
• Helping the state realize value from state IT investments across the enterprise, including
through scale benefits from common procurement standards and gains in operating
efficiency made possible by greater visibility and coordination of projects and applications
across the enterprise.
• Enabling development of integrated, enterprise-wide cybersecurity standards, as well as
capabilities within DIS and departments to enforce modern risk management practices and
promote resiliency against potential cyber risks that may result in data breaches or impede
state operations.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 57
• Developing and supporting for departments in creating positive digital experiences for state
employees and Arkansans, with a focus on ease-of-use, reliability, and clear communication
channels for troubleshooting.
• Clearly defining roles, responsibilities, and governance between DIS and departments to
further facilitate positive IT engagement experiences.
• Partnering with agency leaders to best support (and understand) the strategic and
operational priorities of each department. IT engagements will complement and advance
strategic objectives determined by each agency, with DIS available as a proactive thought
partner, enabler, and source of expertise for agency leaders and department CIOs
• Developing an integrated, enterprise-wide view of state IT assets to identify and pursue
opportunities for efficiency and cross-pollinate best practices across departments. By
developing and managing a holistic perspective of enterprise IT activity and proposals, DIS
will be able to align state IT resources to their highest-value use case.
Arkansas’ DIS can begin increasing the visibility of its value-add by starting with improving the state’s
Help Desk function. While small in gain, beginning with this first phase can help DIS demonstrate
strength in its coordination function by establishing service levels and tracking performance, such
as speed in responding to and favorably resolving tickets. These service levels can outline the
services and strengths DIS has and help it identify “low hanging fruit” within departments where DIS
can provide a superior coordination role. For example, if monitoring of the Help Desk reveals that
75% of issues reported to DIS are related to VPN, DIS can become proactive and begin promulgating
training videos and other resources dedicated to VPN. Finding similar opportunities to harness its
centralized data and support function for customer service orientation will help highlight DIS as the
core agency for coordination and enable DIS to consolidate IT systems and licenses with more ease
moving forward.
DIS can coordinate this effort, as acknowledged in the Arkansas Forward: Strategic Information
Technology Plan by organizing IT functions as follows below in Figure 18.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 58
Figure 18 – Strategic IT Plan IT Function Organization
Source: McKinsey & Company.
Implementation Considerations:
This initiative includes two key areas, which are addressed through the recommendations:
• Short-term actions to move certain functions such as Help Desk to DIS; and,
• Longer-term planning for the transfer of additional functions.
Other State and Federal IT Centralization Models
The New Hampshire Department of Information Technology (DoIT) had to similarly undertake a
customer service framework mentality to successfully centralize its own IT functions. DoIT
underwent centralization nearly 20 years ago, resulting in a model where half of the staff are in-house
and dedicated to shared services (internet service, telecom services, PC support) and the other are
embedded within agencies to act in a liaison-like role to support the agency’s IT needs and act as a
connection point to the centralized DoIT. When centralization occurred, a culture shift enabled the
success of the shared services model, wherein DoIT began to view other agencies it served not as
peer-agencies, but as customers, with DoIT adopting more of a business-mindset. The CIOs at each
agency became chief relationship managers with DoIT, and much of the CIO’s role is managing and
tending to these relationships and relations with state leadership.
North Carolina stands out as a best practice for using transparent reporting to align with customer
service and client expectations. The Statewide IT Procurement Office within the North Carolina
Department of Information Technology recently implemented a new online reporting tool to make
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 59
available information about its activities involving IT products and services. This dashboard provides
monthly reporting metrics “to provide the highest level of customer service” by more effectively
tracking, managing and controlling operations. These metrics include:
• Cumulative savings generated from abnormal quantity threshold process – by month, fiscal
year to date and cumulative.
• Number of active, completed and canceled IT procurements as well as the reported total
value of awarded IT procurements; and,
• Average approval/review cycle time and open approval/review tasks in NC eProcurement –
these two charts track time from all involved in the IT procurement process.
Finally, the United States Chief Information Officers (CIO) Council demonstrates a potential model
for IT governance that Arkansas can consider once the agency has further established its centrality
as an IT resource. The Council is comprised of CIOs from a wide range of federal executive branch
agencies. The Council is established by federal statute, which outlines the Council’s duties as
follows:
• Developing recommendations for the Director of OMB on government information resources
management policies and requirements.
• Sharing experiences, ideas, best practices, and innovative approaches related to information
resources management.
• Assisting the Federal CIO (whose role is to establish the strategic direction of the
Department’s information technology and cybersecurity efforts, oversee the Council’s
budget, and ensure reliable provisioning of enterprise services) in the identification,
development, and coordination of multi-agency projects and other innovative initiatives to
improve Government performance through the use of information technology.
• Promoting the development and use of common performances for agency information
resources management; and,
• Working with the Office of Personnel Management to assess and address the hiring, training,
classification, and professional development of the Federal IT workforce.
The U.S. CIO and the CIO Council establish standards against which the success of all agency
programs can be measured, including:
• Monitoring the year-to-year performance improvement of Federal Government programs.
• Attracting and retaining a high-performance IT workforce.
• Optimizing Federal Government information resources and investments.
• Aligning IT solutions with Federal enterprise business processes.
• Adopting and sharing best IT management practices; and,
• Managing risk and ensuring privacy and security.
Change Management
Change management will need to include involvement of TSS leadership from the outset, with an
emphasis that all consolidation will involve input from department leadership and that their support
is paramount to the effort. Additionally, communication needs to emphasize that DIS will not operate
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 60
centralized functions in a vacuum, but that each department still will have dedicated points of
contact within DIS to reach if they need assistance with an issue or have a question, and that they
know this person will answer their call or call them back promptly to resolve any issues. A process
for feedback will be critical so departments can provide input and feel their voices and experiences
are valued as centralization occurs. Department leadership will need to be able to get facetime with
DIS and even TSS leadership so that complaints can be escalated and resolved appropriately and
promptly.
DIS should also communicate that IT staff will be involved in developing best practice processes and
procedures to minimize culture shock and potentially migrate certain practices that show promise.
For example, when DHS moved to its internal shared services model, it adopted a practice in which
evaluations with new staff involve the employee’s former leadership, so that input can occur even
after an employee migrates to a new role. DIS can help establish buy-in by highlighting a culture of
customer service and creating a scorecard or report card to share its performance.
Considerations for Short-Term Transfer of Staff (e.g., Help Desk):
• DIS will require existing departmental Help Desk staff to migrate to the department to
accomplish this initiative (anticipated to be phased as additional functions are centralized).
DIS may consider whether leaving staff physically collocated within the departments offers
advantages in terms of customer service or if moving the staff to TSS is preferred due to the
opportunity for better team cohesion, skill building, and management.
• DIS will need to meet with each department to negotiate which positions and budget
authority will transfer to TSS and whether existing staff will also transfer.
• An assessment of the skills and knowledge of people who are identified will need to take
place to determine new roles and establish training plans to standardize performance and
elevate the quality of the work.
• TSS will need to develop organizational charts for functions moving to DIS oversight. This
includes determining a manager to staff ratio and determining managerial span.
Considerations for Longer-Term Planning and Transfer of Additional Functions:
Through Arkansas Forward, IT functions have been identified and assessed to identify if there would
be benefit from centralization. While there is greater consensus around Help Desk services,
additional analysis of the appropriate model for application support and development is needed.
Planning for the sequencing of additional functions is needed, as well as the criteria or “stage gates”
for DIS to reach to gain the confidence of leadership and peer departments that the division is ready
to assume additional functions.
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Developing a clear communication plan and strategies to avoid significant turnover among
directly-impacted IT staff. Investing in team building and training resources to support new
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 61
team leads once staff transferring to TSS, to help the teams form and strengthen sense of
belonging by new staff. This will be particularly important if staff remain physically located in
their former buildings in the short term.
• Cultivating a culture of customer service at DIS, to earn the support and buy-in of partner
departments. TSS can make customer service come alive by adopting core customer values,
recognizing and rewarding staff who live by the values (low and no-cost methods could
include a monthly breakfast with leadership, bestowing a physical award or certificate,
recognizing staff in all-staff email newsletters and at town halls, providing staff with physical
objects that include the values such as lanyards or mousepads, and sharing success
stories/videos/vignettes with staff), and using ongoing leadership modelling of these values.
• Establishing clear communication regarding escalation protocols to ensure departmental
customers (secretaries, other leaders, human resources leaders) understand how to engage
with DIS and escalate issues as needed.
• Monitoring the implementation through strategies including one-on-one check-ins with
departmental leaders and surveys and involving key stakeholders from the initiative outset to
reduce risk that cross-departmental stakeholders may not understand or follow new
processes/centralization measures. There may be operational challenges in the
consolidation, but TSS’ willingness to accept and address feedback will be important.
Because Help Desk has been identified as the first functional area to centralize at DIS, specific
recommended steps for implementation include:
• Engaging in individual meetings with each department to negotiate the number of positions
to transfer to DIS (including whether the staff will move with the positions or remain in the
departments).
• Establishing ongoing cadence of meetings with departments to update on the progress of
implementation and create a feedback mechanism to inform further centralization of IT
functions.
• Developing a new organization chart under existing management team to accommodate the
new Help Desk (identifying any gaps in positions or leadership and posting for those positions
as needed).
• Assessing the skills of new staff and develop training plan.
• Developing or procuring resources for new managers (including supervisors) at TSS such as
team-building activities and training for newly formed teams (state may consider contracting
with an entity to facilitate sessions for each new team on becoming a high performing team
and learning to work together and communicate effectively, given different personalities and
styles).
• Reviewing current Help Desk processes using existing policies and procedures with a small
group of transferring staff and existing DIS staff.
• Revising process to reflect any process improvements used within individual departments.
• Developing job aids and refresher training to ensure consistent application of process across
all new staff.
• Conducting shadowing of new employees as a quality control strategy.
• Identifying key performance measures related to Help Desk for use in establishing service
levels/targets.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 62
• Creating a dashboard to monitor Help Desk metrics (and share as part of TSS
dashboard/scorecard).
• Training Help Desk on customer service best practices to help instill change management
around serving the needs of other departments.
• Establishing survey for department leaders and CIOs to monitor their experience during the
transition; and,
• Monitoring ongoing impact of coordination/centralization and adapt as necessary.
Recommended steps for implementing additional centralization among IT roles (future state):
• Reviewing and revising the work plan for each transferring function, based on the steps
outlined above for the Help Desk transfer; and,
• Adapting the approach based on lessons learned from other functions.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: The vision of
DIS is “to lead and optimize technology resources for Arkansas public sector.” Implementing this
initiative is aligned with current department priorities, staffing, and resources.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial TSS staff analysis
indicates that IT systems to track performance metrics (e.g., PowerBI or Tableau) and IT leadership
with expertise in coordination and reporting structures will be necessary to implement this initiative.
This initiative is not likely to result in a substantial cost, given the enterprise contract in place for
these tools.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: DIS staff will review and review Help Desk policies and staff job aids and manuals. A change
management plan is essential to outline, for example, roles, responsibilities, and performance
metrics.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to improve statewide IT service administration, build and maintain a
team of highly qualified state IT professionals (thereby reduce over-reliance on costly IT contractors
at the department level), and deliver high quality services to the departments served by DIS.
Recommended performance measures include:
• Help Desk Ticket resolution (average days).
• Quality of data consistency.
• Number of discrete systems in use.
• Number of licenses in use; and,
• Cybersecurity standards.
Initial priority should be to identify Help Desk-related metrics for use in establishing departmental
service levels (see TSS-9). DIS may consider using time to resolve Help Desk tickets as the primary
metric for this initial centralization effort.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 63
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: Potential savings will be enabled by the further centralization of IT
functions. A methodology is needed to charge departments for Help Desk services to finance these
operations (or full budgetary authority could transfer). Depending on the finance model used, savings
could either be realized within impacted departments or by TSS.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across DIS, departmental IT leadership, and state
leadership is critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are included for each
audience in Figure 19. Key activities and timing for communication plan are included in Appendix A
– TSS Work Plan.
Figure 19 – TSS-13 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Department Leads and • DIS is seeking to improve • Department • Secretary
CIOs efficiencies in state leadership Leslie Fisken
government by reducing meetings • Jay Harton
duplication of roles and (Secretary and
inconsistencies in its IT Chief of Staff)
operations.
• There are benefits to state and
departmental-level
functioning by reducing
duplication as seen in other
states.
• The Help Desk has been
identified as the first
functionality to move to DIS.
As a result, some staff will
transfer to DIS as functions
transfer to DIS.
• DIS will work collaboratively
and in partnership with
departments to identify
efficiencies and develop a
transition plan.
• DIS wants departments to
share in the benefits of this
streamlining and support
agencies gaining efficiencies
such as greater access to
support.
• Discuss assigned resources,
chain of command, points of
contact, and escalation
protocols [insert].
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 64
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
• Service level metrics will be
established to build
accountability and
transparency during this
transition [insert specific
service levels established].
Department IT staff • DIS is seeking to improve • Meetings with • Jay Harton
efficiencies in state Human
government by reducing Resources and IT
duplication of roles and managers.
inconsistencies in state • Town hall style
government operations related meeting with IT
to IT.
• There are benefits to state and
agency-level functioning by
reducing duplication as seen
in other states.
• Some staff will be transferring
to DIS. DIS will work
collaboratively with IT staff to
identify opportunities and
negotiate positions and
workload—this is not a
reduction in force effort but
there may be reconfiguration
of roles and responsibilities.
• Discuss assigned resources,
chain of command, points of
contact, and escalation
protocols [insert].
• Service level metrics will be
established to build
accountability and
transparency during this
transition [insert specific
service levels established].
State leadership • DIS is assuming greater • Leadership • Jay Harton
(Governor’s Office, responsibilities as part of its meetings
Legislature) statewide shared services • Meetings with
model Legislature
• There are benefits to state and • One-on-one
department -level functioning meetings
by reducing duplication as
seen in other states
• DIS requests the support of
the Governor’s Office and
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 65
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Legislature to make this large-
scale effort a success for
Arkansas
• Service level metrics will be
established to build
accountability and
transparency during this
transition [insert specific
service levels established]
Note: There are intentional placeholders for initiative owners to add more detail to the messages
once developed.
Initiative TSS #30 - Create an IT procurement center of excellence
This initiative creates an IT procurement center of excellence within the TSS Division of Information
Systems (DIS) to streamline procurement of IT projects and rate negotiation while optimizing vendor
management practices.
Initiative Overview and Current State:
Analysis conducted during Arkansas Forward and highlighted in the Arkansas Forward Strategic IT
Plan indicates that that Arkansas’s large IT projects are distributed across departments, with limited
formal project governance processes linking DIS, department CIOs, and operating leaders to track
results and overcome implementation barriers. From a procurement perspective, Arkansas faces
long approval cycle times for large orders, limited resources to actively manage vendors within
departments, and missed opportunities to increase buying power state-wide and reduce rates.
According to DIS staff, IT procurement is the most decentralized type of procurement. While state
network and telephony are mandatory, most departments want to maintain control over their help
desk ticketing process and procurements. Under statute, DIS is involved in review of projects over
$100,000, however staff report that their review does not have enough of an enforcement
mechanism, and they have no way to stop or gain additional review of a procurement with which they
have concerns, including if there is a security concern. While DIS acknowledges its role is not to
decide whether or not an agency needs a certain IT product or service, the division believes it could
improve its ability to assist departments with procurements, including being involved earlier in the
process and, if a procurement is approved or moves forward, advise on whether to build or buy a
product, and vet contract terms.
Rationale: By creating an IT procurement center of excellence within DIS, the State can
streamline procurement of IT projects and rate negotiation while optimizing vendor management
practices.
Arkansas Forward benchmarking revealed that with greater visibility into project contract spend, DIS
will be able to consistently and centrally track performance metrics, such as status, schedules, risks,
and budget overages. Standardized and improved governance has the potential to unlock 10-20%
savings across the state (i.e., up to $45 million in savings per year) based on similar efforts in other
organizations.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 66
The Texas Department of Information Resources (DIR) may provide a useful model for consideration.
This agency delivers technology solutions to state and local government entities. Specifically, DIR’s
role is to:
• Offer purchasing support and policy insights so organizations across all levels of Texas
government can find and securely implement modern technology
• Set forth strategic direction for IT statewide through policies and guidance
• Analyze cybersecurity risks and solutions
• Empower state and local government entities with reliable and secure technology
• Assist with technology procurement/purchasing
• Collaborate with technology vendors
• Create a dynamic online community for knowledge sharing.
As stated by DIR on its website, “[t]he approximately 200 professionals who work at DIR are driven by
a sincere desire to make governmental technology more secure, cost-effective, and forward-looking.
We’re honored to serve as the cornerstone of public sector technology in Texas.” DIR’s Contract and
Vendor Management Program, also known as the Cooperative Contracts Program, implements and
manages statewide contracts for IT commodities and the Enterprise (statewide) Contract
Management Program. DIR coordinates, manages, and monitors performance of DIR enterprise
contracts, including contracts for data center services, Texas.gov, and TEX-AN network. Figure 20
below highlights the DIR website’s “Why Buy Through DIR?” content.
Figure 20 – “Why Buy Through DIR?”
Why Buy Through DIR?
• Save Time: DIR goes through a competitive procurement process using the Request for Offer (RFO)
method of procurement to procure Automated Information System (AIS) and Information Technology (IT)
products and services. This cuts the procurement time for our customers dramatically!
• Save Money: We leverage the State of Texas’ purchasing power to get your organization big savings,
meaning you receive discounted pricing with pre-negotiated terms and conditions in compliance with
state procurement rules.
• Easier Process: Easily search for products and services and filter the results. You’ll quickly find the
vendor that’s right for you.
• Quality Assurance: Every DIR approved vendor must comply with the contract in full, meaning they’re
knowledgeable and will meet (and often exceed) your expectations.
Source: DIR, “information for Buying Through DIR.”
All Texas agencies are required to procure through DIR first for AIS commodities and services through
a Cooperative Contract. For AIS "commodity items" including commercial software, hardware, or
technology services, other than telecommunications service, statute requires state agencies to
purchase through a list maintained by DIR, with bids solicited according to different threshold levels
shown below in Figure 21. State agencies must purchase commodities in accordance with contracts
developed by DIR and maintained on the list unless certain requirements are met, including an
exemption from DIR, express approval from a body called the Legislative Budget Board, or a
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 67
certification from the agency that the commodity is not available under an existing contract
developed by DIR.
DIR is also required to partner with state agencies to periodically assess the risk to the state in the
purchase of listed commodity items and, based on the risk assessment and as DIR considers
necessary to ensure accuracy, monitor and verify monthly transaction records for those
commodities submitted by vendors.
Figure 21 – Statutory Threshold Requirements for Texas IT Commodity Purchases
Source: Texas Department of Information Resources.
Categories of IT products and services offered through DIR Cooperative Contracts include Hardware
Products and Related Services, Software Products and Related Services, Technology Services,
Branded Contracts, IT Staffing Services, and Deliverables-Based IT Services (DBITS).
DIR also offers itself as a resource through functions like Digital Project Services, which offers
support at any given point of an agency’s project, including consultation and training on the Project
Delivery Framework, best practices, and tips for de-risking IT projects. DIR’s goal is to help agencies
“deliver projects that support [their] mission, stay within budget, and use leading technology
practices.” Another function, Strategic Digital Services, assists agencies in the adoption of digital
technology, transforming manual processes with digital processes, replacing legacy technology with
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 68
modern technology, and shifting a task workforce to a knowledge workforce. Strategic Digital
Services Program Objectives are as follows:
• Develop a digital transformation toolkit for agencies to use as their guiding principles for
digital transformation.
• Engage with agencies to facilitate workshops that are designed to assess and optimize digital
transformation capabilities.
• Identify digital champions within agencies.
• Establish a digital community and governance.
The Texas Innovation and Education Center (TIEC), embedded in the Strategic Digital Services
division, provides a “Playbook” resource, workshops, training, an innovation lab, and hosts Centers
of Excellence. The current center, the “Artificial Intelligence Center of Excellence (AI-CoE)” was
formed in December 2020 and helps state and local governments use artificial intelligence (AI)
technologies to foster digital transformation and improve efficiency. In 2021, this center was
awarded a State IT Innovation of the Year Award from the Scoop News Group as part of the 2021
StateScoop 50 Awards.
DIS can analyze Texas DIR and its structures, programs, as well as its statutory authority to determine
whether an IT Procurement Center of Excellence would involve some of the functions or authorities
that DIR has. DIR 1) Has a customer-centered approach, positioning itself at the service of state
agencies; 2) has statutory authority that enables it to better provide oversight and monitoring on state
IT contracts. DIS should consider implementing both to successfully create the IT Procurement
Center of Excellence. DIR can therefore provide technical expertise on procurement bid and
oversight documents, negotiate best value IT statewide contracts, and otherwise serve as an IT
subject-matter expert and customer service resource for the state.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Provide detailed justifications, extensive training, and support from leadership to ensure buy-
in and adoption of changes to mitigate the risk that there could be ambiguity among affected
roles as to why centralization changes are being made.
• Establish clear communication channels and involve key stakeholders from the initiative
outset to minimize the risk that cross-departmental stakeholders may not understand or
follow new processes/centralization measures.
• Emphasize partnership/collaboration with agency SMEs and “customer service” function to
minimize risk that agencies pushback on procurement centralization.
• Develop process for review and an exception/expediated process for contract revisions so
projects are not delayed and agencies do not purposefully manipulate policies to avoid
review.
Recommended steps for implementing IT procurement center of excellence (future state):
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 69
• Establish the organizational structure, purpose, and operating norms of the IT procurement
center of excellence
• Conduct a detailed current state assessment of IT procurement processes, including vendor
management practices, negotiation procedures, and best practice documentation and
deployment
o Need to determine internally what departments are capable of handling and should
manage
• Conduct internal focus group to determine what TSS wants to manage
• Conduct focus group with other departments to determine what they wish to retain, why and
why not centralized
• Identify key areas for improvement and define solution set of process and policy changes
• Outline both necessary and nice-to-have systems capabilities to support process and policy
changes in IT procurement
• Syndicate changes with TSS, departmental, and external stakeholders and receive necessary
approvals
• Implement supporting technologies to manage interactions between the CoE and
departmental stakeholders
• Develop detailed documentation of process modifications and how department IT and
procurement leadership should engage with the IT CoE on future procurements
• Communicate organizational changes and train employees
• Monitor ongoing impact and adapt as necessary
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: The vision of
DIS is “to lead and optimize technology resources for Arkansas public sector.” Implementing this
initiative is aligned with current department priorities, staffing, and resources.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial TSS staff analysis
indicates that IT systems to track performance metrics (e.g., PowerBI or Tableau) and IT leadership
with expertise in coordination and reporting structures will be necessary to implement this initiative.
TSS has existing contracts with both vendors; depending on the needs, nominal cost could be
incurred.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: DIS will need to develop significant policies and procedures to coordinate IT roles, including
what IT goods and services should be centralized and what the respective roles and responsibilities
for IT will be for DIS versus agency IT staff
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to improve the negotiation and management of vendors for IT-related
projects. Recommended performance measures include:
• Cost savings related to contract re-negotiation; and,
• Percent of IT contracts with key performance indicators and established penalties included.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 70
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: No potential savings were identified as a direct result of this initiative.
However, this initiative is an enabling practice to improve the management of procurements and
vendor negotiation, which has been estimated to offer a significant potential savings to be realized
by the State of Arkansas.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across OSP, DIS, state procurement leadership,
and department CIOs is critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are
included for each audience in Figure 22. Key activities and timing for communication plan are
included in Appendix A – TSS Work Plan.
Figure 22 – TSS-30 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Secretaries, department • DIS is establishing an IT • Meeting of state • Secretary
CIOs, department Procurement Center of department Leslie
procurement leads Excellence to make it easier leaders and CIOs Fisken
and more efficient to assess • Jay Harton
and procure IT goods and
services
• We know departments
understand their own business
needs; DIS is here to support
and lend expertise, technical
knowledge, and exceptional
service
• Support and encouraged
adoption by department
leadership is necessary for the
success of the CoE as well as
to make IT procurement in
Arkansas as efficient and
effective as possible
• DIS welcomes opportunities to
collaborate with department
leadership to ensure DIS is
providing excellent service and
providing agencies what they
need
TSS Initiative #36 - Establish statewide data hub
Establish a statewide data hub that will enable integrated service delivery to increase the efficiency
and comprehensiveness of government services, enhance the cohesiveness of Arkansan
experience, and make use of leading technologies that improve business process efficiency and
lower costs.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 71
Initiative Overview and Current State: During many recent legislative sessions,
Arkansas has passed legislation aimed at consolidating and managing state data so that it can be
efficiently and effectively utilized to improve state government functions. In 2023, during the 94th
General Assembly’s Regular Session, Act 634 required the state to “develop a shared services data
hub for statewide data sharing in order to: (i) Drive innovation and facilitate efficiency across state
agencies; (ii) Improve the delivery of services; and (iii) Better serve the residents of this state.” This
task was charged to the Data and Transparency Panel is created within the Department of
Transformation and Shared Services (ACA Sec. 25-4-127). This Panel sits within the Secretary’s Office
at TSS, within the ARDATA function.
The data hub is an evolution of past work by TSS and the Data Transparency Panel on a state data
warehouse. After efforts to break down agency siloes and consolidate state data in one place, the
data hub will now enable seamless access to state data across agencies. Currently, every
program/department has its own system and applications. Historically, when departments have
desired to share data, this collaboration would require peer to peer integrations of applications for
all information to be made seamlessly available to consumer. The data hub will remove the need for
peer-to-peer integrations so that a government service/department portal can tap into the Data Hub.
Arkansas has discussed the need for a data hub since at least 2019. The 92nd General Assembly
established a Data-Sharing and Data-Driven Decision-Making Task Force (Data-Sharing Task Force)
tasked with analyzing:
1. The possibility of implementing a shared services model for statewide data-sharing.
2. Specific solutions and legislation necessary to create a statewide data sharing system for
public state agency data; and,
3. Funding mechanisms.
In an article posted on the website Talk Business and Politics in 2019, the author recounts the
taskforce’s inaugural meeting, in which DIS presented a “proof of concept” created for public safety
agencies to examine the root causes behind recidivism and how to solve Arkansas’ large prison
population through data sharing and collaboration. This work was touted as an example of what
could be built upon for the Arkansas Data Hub. DIS cited that the hub would require an investment
of roughly $4 million to initiate those business cases with another $1 million in annual maintenance
costs. Charging agencies for DIS services was discussed, but while DIS indicated that it is a cost
recovery agency, it was agreed that the HUB should be cost-neutral to the greatest extent possible. 6
This Data Hub is viewed as critical by the ARDATA and TSS teams. The master data management tool
that exists within the data hub will allow TSS and the state to resolve multiple records from multiple
systems and look at user resolution. The Data Hub will be able to integrate multiple source systems
in real time and enable the state to check for records of a specific person. For example, if someone
has a license that is up for renewal, they may be able to look-up when to renew, while also identifying
taxes owed. An entity resolution Machine Learning/AI app within the hub will enable users to apply a
6
Will Gruber, Vice President at inVeritas, “Data-driven decision making,” July 16, 2019,
https://talkbusiness.net/2019/07/data-driven-decision-making/.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 72
model that identifies records to create a Master Citizen record that has every engagement a person
has with the state of Arkansas.
Eventually, the plan is for the data hub to also enable citizens to have a one-stop-shop that makes it
easy for Arkansans to connect to government services. TSS has initiated an effort to create the
Arkansas Government Portal, a first-in-the nation portal where citizens can access over 1,200
services across over 15 departments and other agencies (discussed in greater detail in TSS-39). The
Government Services Portal will build upon the integration features that exists within the Data Hub
so that Arkansas can have an integrated statewide delivery system. TSS is aware that other
departments including the Department of Finance and Administration (DFA) and Workforce
Development Board (WDB) have also expressed developing or implementing their own portal tools,
a DMV services portal and CiviForm for enrolling in benefits, respectively.
TSS received a multi-year American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) award to procure three years of hardware
and software needed to power the data hub. TSS is currently in the procurement process after
receiving Arkansas Legislative Council approval. While this funding will cover technical needs to
establish the data hub, labor costs to develop the hub are not covered, and there is concern about
where funding for the future will come from after the expiration of the ARPA funds. TSS is conscious
of the challenge this presents, as they anticipate there will be large demand for the data hub from
state agencies once it is established.
The department’s labor is funded by a cost-recovery model, therefore, to operate the data hub, the
agency will need to have a strategy in place to understand the usage rate and budget appropriately.
The proper cost has not been established and TSS is working internally to determine cost/rates for
the state agency department’s use. For the next three years, grants will cover the labor costs for the
agency as they relate to the data hub, but beyond this period they will need to identify another funding
stream. One strategy recommended by other states is to explore the utilization of enhanced federal
Medicaid funding (90% federal match/10% state funding) to fund application of the hub in a narrow
scoped manner for purposes or serving the Medicaid population, which the state could build on in
the future to expand beyond Medicaid. This would require submission of an Advanced Planning
Document (APD) for federal approval.
Rationale: By establishing a statewide data hub, Arkansas will enable integrated service delivery
to increase the efficiency and comprehensiveness of government services, enhance the
cohesiveness of Arkansan experience, and make use of leading technologies that improve business
process efficiency and lower costs.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 73
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Ensure cross-departmental team clearly defines the nature of relevant data sources, create
matching keys to reconcile historical data, and standardize data going forward where
possible to address the risk that data may not be clean enough to reliably consolidate for
integrated service delivery
• Launch an awareness campaign (both internal for state employees and external for
Arkansans) to educate and inform about the benefits of a statewide data hub, ensure success
of TSS-39 initiative of deploying platforms that leverage statewide data hub in a user-friendly
way to address the risk that stakeholders may not use the statewide data hub
• Continuous funding for TSS labor costs will be a significant risk after expiration of ARPA
funding and current grants; develop a cost recovery model, such as charging member-
agencies a usage fee, or advocating for a legislative appropriation, to sustain the data hub.
• Coordinate with Governor’s Office, DFA, and Workforce to ensure that government service
portals are not duplicative, conflicting, or incompatible. DFA’s DMV portal and WDB’s
CiviForm if compatible, could be developed in conjunction with the statewide data hub as a
“quick wins” for the project.
o DFA and TSS executive leadership involvement is needed to develop the strategy
around this implementation. The integration of state databases and connecting
personal data with different state agency systems to create a unique dataset for a
single person has many complexities that will include continuous monitoring and
collaboration from executive leadership to ensure eventual success of not only this
initiative, but the overall Arkansas Government Services Portal.
o DFA and TSS may consider if it would be helpful to have DFA go ahead and issue the
RFI to gain insight from the vendor community, since this type of innovation has not
been tried and tested in Arkansas and other jurisdictions and DFA has already drafted
an RFI. This could continue to inform evolution of the project.
• To address past departmental concerns over losing control over data, reinforce DIS’ role as
the aggregator of the data and the importance of individual departments in data ownership,
integrity, and governance.
Recommended steps for implementing statewide data hub (future state) (*indicates completed
or in progress):
• Fund and procure data hub infrastructure*
• A detailed project plan and project manager will be required to manage this process. Without
knowing how DFA and TSS will scope this project, a detailed plan cannot be formed. However,
important considerations include:
o Need for more project management resources at DFA and TSS
o Project governance
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 74
o Identify funding source for long-term sustainability
o Obtaining market feedback (DFA was preparing to release an RFI in April 2024 and
stands ready to issue and work with TSS in collaboration)
• Complete security, business continuity, and architecture planning*
• Install physical hardware, provisional cloud hosting, software, and services
• Establish interdepartmental steering committee for training, onboarding, and operational
support
• Analyze current programmatic structures and develop business cases for which
agency/function lends itself most to data hub as pilot
o Conduct cost study by surveying other state data hubs
o Consider different funding models
• Develop and deliver instructional materials
• Establish data sharing and governance support
• Establish system administration and operational support
• Complete phased rollout
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: ARData “strives
to use data to help make Arkansas more efficient and effective. Using data-driven decision-making
requires the ARData team to develop a continuous and routine problem-solving process.”
Implementing this initiative is aligned with current department priorities, staffing, and resources,
however coordination of these with other agencies will be required to implement this initiative.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial TSS staff analysis
indicates that a cross-departmental team of data experts, specialists for coordination and
integration of data tables systems, as well as funding for system upgrades and data consolidation
will be required to implement this initiative.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: TSS/ARDATA will need to develop policies and procedures to implement the data hub
including data sharing agreements, onboarding documents, policies for use, and potentially a fee
structure.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to create a statewide resource for accessing, analyzing, and utilizing
data. Recommended performance measures include:
• Number of users onboarded.
• Number of systems integrated.
• Number of departments onboarded; and,
• Decisions automated.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: No direct potential savings were identified in relation to this initiative. This
initiative could enable savings to be achieved through other initiatives.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 75
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across TSS, departments, and state leadership is
critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are included for each audience in
Figure 23. Key activities and timing for communication plan are included in Appendix A – TSS Work
Plan.
Figure 23 – TSS-30 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
State department leads • Arkansas has the opportunity • Meeting of state • Heather
to implement data tool long in department Saco
the making and take the state leaders
into a new frontier of data
access and integration, both
for state employees and
citizens
• Roll out will need to be
conducted thoughtfully and
with an eye towards
sustainability past the
expiration of ARPA funds
• TSS will need partnership of
agencies to identify best
approach to roll out and
consider how to sustain the
hub
• TSS will need partnership of
agencies to ensure the hub
fulfills its potential for the
state
DFA and WDB • Arkansas is fortunate to have • Agency • Heather Saco
multiple opportunities for data leadership • Secretary
integration and access— meetings Leslie Fisken
cannot miss opportunity due • Jay Harton
to competing projects
• How can each initiative
support the others so there is
no competition for state time,
attention, and resources?
Arkansans • Arkansas is positioned to • Social media • Heather Saco
elevate its government • TV
services to provide best-in- • Radio
class experience for taxpayers • Newspaper
• Accessing government publications
information and programs will
be easier, more reliable, and
faster than ever
• Arkansas Data Hub can save
citizens time and money by
enabling one-stop source for
all government needs
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 76
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
• Protection of private
information paramount to the
success; need to have trust
Initiative TSS #39 - Deploy Arkansan- and employee-facing platforms to
leverage statewide data hub
This initiative focuses on deploying Arkansan- and employee-facing platforms that leverage the
statewide data hub to increase the efficiency and comprehensiveness of government services,
enhance the cohesiveness of Arkansan experience, and make use of leading technologies that
improve business process efficiency and lower cost.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Data Hub is viewed as critical by the ARDATA
team and TSS (see TSS-36). The master data management tool that exists within the data hub will
allow TSS and the state to resolve multiple records from multiple systems and look at user resolution.
The Data Hub will be able to integrate multiple source systems in real time and enable the state to
check for records of a specific person.
Eventually, the plan is for the data hub to also enable citizens to have a one-stop shop that makes it
easy for Arkansans to connect to government services. As noted in TSS-36, TSS is in the process of
developing the Arkansas Government Portal, which will build upon the integration features that exists
within the Data Hub so that Arkansas can have an integrated statewide delivery system. In addition,
other departments, including the Department of Finance and Administration, have active projects to
establish portals for their clients (see DFA-14). The intent of these solutions is for a member of the
public to have a secure, personalized account where they can initiate and access all available online
government services. A personalized dashboard would displace relevant licenses, renewals,
benefits, and services received.
TSS is working with a non-profit conglomerate of large employers and states called Research
Improving People’s Lives (RIPL) to develop this platform. RIPL includes partners such as, the National
Governors Association, Social Security Administration, Google, Walmart, and the states of Rhode
Island, Virginia, and Colorado.
Rationale: Implementation of an Arkansan and employee-facing function through the data hub
helps TSS to achieve its mission to improve the effectiveness of government. By leveraging the data
hub, state employees can better serve constituents and improve perceptions of government
services.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 77
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Ensure cross-departmental team clearly defines the nature of all data sources, create
matching keys to reconcile historical data, and standardize data going forward where
possible to mitigate the risk that data is not clean enough to reliably consolidate for
integrated service delivery.
• Coordinate with Governor’s Office, the Department of Finance and Administration, and the
Department of Commerce to ensure that government service portals are not duplicative,
conflicting, or incompatible. DFA’s DMV portal and WDB’s CiviForm if compatible, could be
developed in conjunction with the statewide data hub as a “quick wins” for the project.
• Launch a publicity campaign (both internal for state employees and external for state
Arkansans) to educate the public about the benefits of the statewide data hub, ensure
success of TSS-39 initiative of deploying platforms that leverage statewide data hub in a user-
friendly way to minimize the risk that people do not make use of the statewide data hub.
Recommended steps for deploying Arkansan and employee-facing platforms (future state):
• Establish interdepartmental task force to identify and prioritize statewide data hub use cases
(prioritizing work already completed at DFA and other departments).
• Engage departments in sourcing use cases for statewide data hub; prioritize most valuable
use cases.
• Create design and implementation plan for prioritized platforms, including timeline, project
and design teams and roles, budgetary requirements, legal requirements, and
risks/mitigations.
• Secure funding and resources for prioritized platforms.
• Conduct design phase of prioritized platforms.
• Conduct user testing and refinement phase of prioritized platforms.
• Create marketing and training materials to publicize and educate Arkansans and employees
on how to use platforms.
• Establish system administration and operational support.
• Complete phased rollout.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: ARData “strives
to use data to help make Arkansas more efficient and effective. Using data-driven decision-making
requires the ARData team to develop a continuous and routine problem-solving process.”
Implementing this initiative is aligned with current department priorities, staffing, and resources,
however coordination of these with other agencies will be required to implement this initiative.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial TSS staff analysis
indicates that a cross-departmental team of data and customer experience experts, specialists for
coordination, and integration of data-table systems will be necessary to implement this initiative.
Costs are to be determined but may include IT setup costs. IT system upgrades and database
integrations will also be required resources. It is anticipated TSS will require a marketing /
communication budget of approximately $100,000 to design a campaign to educate the public about
its new Government Services Portal. Previously, other state agencies including DFA have contracted
with an external firm for the creation of such a campaign.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 78
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: A detailed project plan and project manager will be required to manage this process. A
project plan will need to include strategies to ensure there is alignment between TSS and other
departments with portal initiatives. Important considerations include:
• Identifying available project management resources at TSS.
• Determining project governance (should be part of process contemplated in FUNC-73).
• Determining project scope. Executive-level agreement between TSS and DFA/ACOM is
needed to scope TSS’ Government Services portal project, given the desire by DFA and ACOM
to proceed with their own portals. Key questions include: will TSS’ portal include
departments such as DFA and ACOM in initial functionality or will these departments be
permitted to pursue their own projects as long as solutions developed integrate into the
eventual Government Services Portal?
• Identifying long term funding sources (develop departmental charge-back methodology,
assumed funding for specific projects will come from departments such DFA).
• Obtaining market feedback (releasing an RFI in April 2024 and stands ready to issue and work
with TSS in collaboration).
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The primary
indicator this initiative would seek to improve is employee/citizen satisfaction. There could be
benefits realized across departments as more transactions occur online, which could reduce
processing time for various government transactions.
Recommended performance measures for public-facing applications include:
• Users onboarded.
• Number of transactions performed using the portal.
• Satisfaction rate (such as Net Promoter Score – a national measure used to assess whether
an individual would recommend doing business with the State of Arkansas to their family or
friends).
• Number of discrete functions or services offered on portal.
• Number of departmental data sources integrated through the data hub.
Recommended performance measures for public-facing applications include:
• State employe users onboarded; and,
• Decisions automated (to be defined).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: TSS’ preliminary estimates indicate this initiative could result in $7 million
in recurring positive fiscal impact each year. This includes a combination of revenue generated
through efficiencies staff gain from being able to access data, online/self-service tasks and cost
savings/cost avoidance from enhanced citizen self-service, which could reduce operational costs at
departments related to phone calls, appointments/office visits, and other transactional tasks which
will be automated. The basis for this savings has been proven through existing online self-service
functionality such as renewing driver’s license at the “MyDMV,” which could be realized across
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 79
additional government agencies when services are offered through the portal. This savings would be
realized within the budgets of multiple departments (not within TSS’ budget).
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across state departments and engagement of the
public is essential to this initiative’s success. There is a need to develop and implement a marketing
campaign that can drive the public to the new portal to maximize the investment that TSS has made
in improving their experience. This project is a significant “win” for TSS and the State of Arkansas and
has the potential to impact how citizens view state government if communicated appropriately.
Although this portal is intended to be more robust, the experience of DFA in launching its “MyDMV”
website in 2017 is instructive for TSS. DFA, in partnership with the Information Network of Arkansas
(INA), launched the “Skip the Trip” public awareness campaign that leveraged social media, ads,
print communications, homepage callouts, trade show displays, and media relations.
Representatives from DFA attended county fairs and worked with INA to produce marketing swag,
business cards, flyers, and pop-ups to catch attendees’ attention. This effort was successful in
converting a portion of the public to be online “self-servers.”
Recommended messaging and modalities are included for each audience in Figure 24. Key activities
and timing for communication plan are included in Appendix A – Work Plan.
Figure 24 – TSS-39 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
State agency secretaries • Arkansas has the opportunity • Meeting of • Heather Saco
and CIOs to implement data tool long in secretaries and
the making and take the state CIOs
into a new frontier of data
access and integration, both
for state employees and
citizens
• Roll out will need to be
conducted thoughtfully and
with an eye towards
sustainability past the
expiration of ARPA funds
• TSS will need partnership of
agencies to identify best
approach to roll out and
consider how to sustain the
hub
• TSS will need partnership of
agencies to ensure the hub
fulfills its potential for the
state
Departments with • Arkansas fortunate to have • One-on-one • Heather Saco
existing projects (DFA, multiple opportunities for data leadership
WDB leadership) integration and access— meetings
cannot miss opportunity due
to competing projects
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 80
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
• How can each initiative
support the others so there is
no competition for state time,
attention, and resources?
• Will these projects continue as
free-standing projects or
become incorporated into this
larger effort?
TSS staff • TSS is reinforcing its customer • Emails to IT staff • Heather Saco
service values through new • Agency meetings
data capabilities • Website postings
• Improving customer
experience is our goal.
• Customer service is
everyone’s responsibility.
• We are going to provide tools
and training to reinforce these
values and skills.
Arkansans • Arkansas is positioned to • Social media • Heather
elevate its government • TV Saco
services to provide best-in- • Radio
class experience for taxpayers • Newspaper
• Accessing government publications
information and programs will
be easier, more reliable, and
faster than ever
• Arkansas Data Hub can save
citizens time and money by
enabling one-stop source for
all government needs
• Protection of private
information paramount to the
success; need to have trust
Functional Initiative #4 - Standardize specifications for long tail purchases
This initiative standardizes specifications for long tail purchases by determining most commonly purchased
products, rationalizing where certain products are exceptionally high in price, except in special cases,
creating product specification policies, and conducting Invitations For Bids for statewide contracts
on products with those specifications. In the typical distribution of contracts, the top 20% account
for approximately 80% of expenditures; this initiative is focused on the group of small dollar value
contracts, which collectively account for approximately 20% of contract expenditures and 80% of
contractual relationships. This group is known as the “long tail” of purchasing, which today remain
the purview of individual departments and represent an untapped area of savings for the State of
Arkansas.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 81
Initiative Overview and Current State: The TSS Office of State Procurement (OSP) has
primary responsibility and oversight for the Statewide procurement of commodities, technical and
professional services for all state agencies, boards and commissions, and colleges and universities.
OSP also provides training in Arkansas procurement laws, regulations, and policies.
While Arkansas has centralized its procurement function within OSP, interviews with staff indicate
that agencies currently craft their own RFPs and standardization across agencies is lacking. During
Arkansas Forward field work, it was discovered that OSP has multiple opportunities to improve the
functioning of procurement for statewide contracts, which may lead to significant savings. Following
a Global Procurement Excellence 360 review, Arkansas’s procurement performance was compared
to industry best practices. The findings revealed strengths in the state’s procurement strategy,
including that current procurement policies and process standardization lay the groundwork for
operational effectiveness between departments. The assessment also revealed several gaps in the
state’s procurement maturity:
• Arkansas scored slightly below the public sector average in overall procurement assessment
and lagged top-performing peers across several categories.
• The lack of overall procurement strategy creates suboptimal sourcing, limiting value capture
• Categories, performance metrics, and KPIs could be further defined and tracked to boost
procurement performance.
• Supplier development and management functions could be strengthened and formalized.
• Adoption of digital capabilities could be increased to standardize and monitor spend.
• Talent development mechanisms could be improved to boost internal knowledge and
capabilities.
Long tail purchases are typically defined as the amount an organization spends on purchases that
make up approximately 80 percent of transactions but cover only 20 percent of total spend. While
these purchases appear small, they can accumulate to create inefficiencies, such as where a state
like Arkansas is undertaking the purchases across multiple departments. OSP indicates that
standardization of contracting across the state is lacking, presenting an opportunity to improve long
tail purchasing.
Rationale: By adopting digital capabilities, increasing standardization, and pooling procurement
across state agencies, OSP can improve long tail purchasing, which can help the state realize cost
savings through standardized price points/requirements and reducing inconsistencies.
Crown Commercial Services, which bills itself as “the biggest public procurement organization in the
UK” highlights the risks of unmanaged tail spending for public organizations 7: “Tail
spend…purchases are often not visible until they appear in an organization’s end-of-year accounts
and can cause significant budget pressures if not controlled…While tail spend is often referred to as
low value spend, this is not always the case. Tail spending can take a lot of different forms. It contains
spending that presents risks and inefficiencies to government buyers, including:
7
Crown Commercial Service, “Tail Spend Solution,” https://www.crowncommercial.gov.uk/agreements/rm6202.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 82
• low price, high frequency: these are items that have low individual value, but over time, are a
significant amount of spend
• low price, low frequency: items at the far end of the tail of spending
• misclassified spending: items that are individually purchased and should be consolidated
into existing supply contracts and competition systems
• fragmented spending: items that are repeatedly purchased by various parts of the
organization that could be consolidated
• maverick spending: spending that falls outside of the organization’s procurement guidelines
• unaddressed spending: items that have not been addressed by procurement in a reasonable
period (generally considered to be two to three years)
• unusual spending: high value items that are new procurements or are procured only once, or
so rarely that the organization’s procurement staff has no expertise in the area.”
It is recommended that OSP, in conjunction with other state procurement officials, standardize
product categorization and taxonomies across departments and create category strategies, identify
which commodities should be sourced via statewide contracts, and renegotiate current contracts as
they expire and optimize future contracts. These efforts address tail spend risks such “misclassified
spending,” “low price, high frequency,” “unaddressed spending,” and “fragmented spending.”
The potential impact on cost savings is considerable. A 2016 study by the Hackett Group finding
respondent-companies that actively managed tail spend realized savings: 27% of companies said
that they experienced savings of 5% to 10%, while 20% of companies had savings of at least 10%.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Establish the exceptions process to ensure that overrides of standard specifications are only
permitted in OSP-defined use cases and very infrequently ad hoc to mitigate the risk that
departments may obtain unwarranted exceptions
• Craft the specifications alongside most impacted department “SMEs” to ensure that
products fulfill the needs of state employees to address the risk that employees may be
dissatisfied with the products
• Include impacted department SMEs in the processes of procurement and selection to reduce
the risk of alienating state employees with first-hand knowledge of agency needs
Recommended steps for implementing improving long tail purchasing (future state):
• Solicit department data inputs and use analytics to determine top spend on long tail
commodity purchases and select standardizable products and/or product groupings
• Conduct market research to develop a fact base for best value product specs, including
checking GSA, NASPO, and other public/private sector benchmarks
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 83
• Request input on proposed specifications for each product from a subset of CIOs, then
gather in person as needed to work through revisions
• Agree upon specifications for each product type, as well as specific exceptions
• Review historical purchasing behavior across departments and forecast demand for
upcoming time periods
• Determine if existing contracts or new statewide contracts will be best for each
• Launch procurements for statewide contracts for products and product families
• Invest in professional skills development and training for negotiators
• Review, negotiate, and award statewide contracts for products and product families
• Gather input to determine if there is justification for the contract not being mandatory;
otherwise, prepare proposal to ALC for mandatory use of statewide contract
• Communicate changes to relevant purchasers across state government
• Track average purchase price of each commodity over next 3-24 months and compare to
historical average prices to capture savings value
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: OSP is
committed to “effective, efficient, and ethical procurement.” From the inception of TSS, OSP was
envisioned as the statewide procurement entity to improve contracting through leveraging the state’s
buying power, improving coordination, and eliminating duplication and inconsistency. Implementing
this initiative is aligned with current department priorities, staffing, and resources, however it is
crucial to consider that augmented staffing and resources will be necessary.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial TSS staff analysis
indicates that procurement data analysts and dedicated engagement from department procurement
leads will be required to adequately implement this initiative, as well as IT systems to support spend
data analysis.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: TSS and other state agency procurement leadership will need to establish policies and
procedures to effectively implement this initiative. A change management plan is essential to outline,
for example, roles, responsibilities, and performance metrics.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to improve statewide contracting for long tail purchases, therefore saving
the state by leveraging its purchase power to obtain competitive or bulk pricing and eliminate
redundancies and inconsistencies throughout long tail purchases. Recommended performance
measures include:
• Total spending on “long tail” products.
• Total long tail savings contract captured (assumes establishment of a savings methodology
whereas reduced spending amount from shift to competitive or bulk pricing is captured at
each department level and aggregated).
• Number of statewide contracts; and,
• Percentage of total spending on statewide contracts.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 84
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: TSS estimates this initiative could result in $34 million in annual recurring
savings. This savings would be realized within the budgets of multiple departments (not only at TSS).
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across OSP, state procurement leadership, and
the vendor market is critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are included
for each audience in Figure 25. Key activities and timing for communication plan are included in
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan.
Figure 25 – FUNC-4 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Agency procurement • OSP undertaking joint effort • Leadership • Tanya
leads/staff with state agency meetings Freeman
procurement entities to • Emails
increase efficiency of state • Town hall style
purchasing with a focus on meeting
long tail purchases
• Long tail purchases may seem
insignificant, but the state has
potential to realize significant
savings through the
identification and analysis of
long tail spending
• Collaboration critical to help
identify these contracts;
centralizing the contracts can
result in significant savings
and efficiencies for state, but
centralization will not occur
without the input and
guidance of agency SMEs
Vendors • Arkansas is overhauling how it • Social media • OSP/TSS
contracts for certain services • Open Comms
• State contracts for certain trainings/info Team
services are going to become sessions for the
more common; vendors will be public
appropriately notified of any • Vendor list
changes relevant to contracts announcement
coming up for renewal or for • OSP website
invitations to bid on future posting
contracts • AR-Buy posting
• Improved oversight and
centralization ensures every
vendor has a chance to do fair
business with the state of
Arkansas and make their best
bid
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 85
Functional Initiative #11 - Optimize contracts for professional services
This initiative optimizes contracts for professional services by establishing best practices,
benchmarking rates, and building negotiation skills. Implementing this recommendation has the
potential to improve the efficiency of state contracts for services, reducing change orders, and
potentially reducing costs to the state for these services.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Office of State Procurement (OSP) has
primary responsibility and oversight for the Statewide procurement of commodities, technical and
professional services for all state agencies, boards and commissions and colleges and universities.
OSP also provides training in Arkansas procurement laws, regulations, and policies. According to the
Office, OSP handles special procurements, exception process, and sole source procurements.
Services as they relate to state contracts are defined under ACA §19-11-203 (27)(A) as “furnishing of
labor, time, or effort by a contractor that does not produce tangible commodities.” Statute includes
the following non-exclusive examples of services: consulting services; personal services;
professional services; technical and general services; and the furnishing of labor, time, or effort by a
contractor for the generation, customization, configuration, or development of software and other
intangible property other than technical support incidental to the procurement of proprietary
software. Service contracts are required to be reported to OSP if they meet a certain value threshold
for one year.
During Arkansas Forward benchmarking, it was noted that across procurement functions, most time
and resources are devoted to compliance with procurement laws and review processes, with limited
capacity for broader strategic initiatives focused on unlocking value, understanding the state’s
procurement needs, and facilitating an effective, efficient process to fulfill those needs.
During the spend benchmarking analysis for Arkansas, it was revealed that professional services was
the largest spend category, followed by IT services, facility management, other categories (e.g.,
medical, education, equipment, etc.), rental/leases, and IT commodities. Together, these spend
categories account for Arkansas’s roughly $1.7B in procurement spend.
According to OSP staff, despite efforts to centralize and standardize statewide contracting, there are
still barriers and gaps that are hindering OSP’s ability to achieve optimal effectiveness and efficiency
in service contracts. OSP indicates that agencies currently craft their own Requests for Proposals
(RFPs), including for statewide service contracts, such as janitorial services. While OSP maintains a
qualified vendor list, many vendors do not have rates listed, and state agencies are not required to
utilize this list, nor are there requirements that agencies document whether they posted solicitation
bids with the list or document why a qualified vendor was not selected for a bid.
OSP reports there is also no standardization in pricing for statewide service contracts, which leads
to irregularity across agencies for the provision of common services. Janitorial services were recently
converted to a statewide contract to standardize pricing, however other statewide services could
also benefit from this standardization. Further, staff indicate that there are often specializations
within service contracts, but often these are not identified, and rates do not reflect different levels of
specialization. OSP has indicated it is planning to look at all services contracts to determine whether
they can also be converted to statewide contracts with standard pricing.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 86
In 2020 Arkansas announced the implementation of a new statewide e-procurement system at TSS
called “AR-Buy” intended to provide a unified procurement process “save money, improve
transparency, and empower local businesses throughout Arkansas.” AR-Buy is in Phase 1 of its
implementation. Once fully implemented, any supplier or individual wishing to receive purchase
orders from the State or receive notice of and participate in solicitations will need to be registered in
ARBuy. Until the transition to ARBuy is complete, vendors must also be registered with Arkansas
Vendor Services to contract with the State. Many state organizations, use the Arkansas
Administrative Statewide Information System (AASIS) as the electronic system of record for
procurement. AASIS houses the procurement records from the first step of initiating a purchase to
the last step of finalizing the purchase. However, staff interviews with OSP indicate that the current
AASIS system is not integrated with AR-Buy. Staff also indicate that OSP does not currently have an
efficient means of tracking or even quantifying the number of professional services contracts there
are across state government currently.
Arkansas Procurement Law requires any State employee who conducts a procurement to be trained
and certified, with varying requirements depending on the value of contracts the employee is
approved to authorize. Any state employee that conducts procurement is required by law to receive
a minimum amount of procurement instruction annually—those who can authorize contracts of $75
million or more must have at least 2 hours of continuing procurement training annually, while those
who authorize lower amounts must have at least 1 hour. 8 TSS administers “The State Procurement
Training and Certification Program,” which has a curriculum consisting of two training programs: one
for “requisitioners” and one for “buyers.” These programs provide training on initiating and executing
the procurement process, with the material derived from Arkansas Procurement Law.
Both trainings administered by TSS include units on negotiation, however OSP staff believe there are
opportunities to improve the training and skills of state employees authorized to contract for the state
when it comes to negotiation, including OSP staff. Further, OSP believes the department can have a
greater role in state contracting through implementing contracting best practices as they relate to
service contracts.
Rationale: Compiling negotiation best practices, identifying large contracts upcoming for bid,
training negotiators, conducting market research to benchmark rates, and executing best-in-class
negotiation process for professional services contracts has the potential to result in improved
efficiencies in state contracts, such as cost savings through standardized price points/requirements,
reduced inconsistencies, and reduced time spent in ordering duplicative supplies.
During the benchmarking process, as indicated in the Arkansas Forward Strategic Procurement Plan,
suggested changes related to Arkansas’ procurement practices identified by McKinsey center on
three priorities — getting the “right stuff”, at the “right (total) price”, through the “right processes”.
Procuring at the “right (total) price” includes consolidating contracts for commodities and services
and enhancing rigor of the RFP process for major solicitations to achieve better rates and terms. By
undertaking the “right price” improvements to professional service contracts in Arkansas within 8-
10%, McKinsey projects the state could see an estimated value return of $65-98 million.
8
TSS State Procurement Training and Certification Program,
https://www.transform.ar.gov/procurement/procurement-resources/training/.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 87
Initiative FUNC-11 directs the department to optimize contracts for professional services
division through the adoption of service contract best practices and increased training.
Some opportunities for state procurement strategies involve improved categorization and grouping
of contract types. In conducting this effort, OSP can identify categories of professional service
contracts across the enterprise that can be bundled into a single statewide contract, therefore
providing increased consistency, reduced duplication, and potentially, more competitive rates from
vendors for these common services. It also would enable an enterprise-wide perspective on
specialization level within service contracts, enabling more nuanced pricing.
For other professional service contracts that remain ideally procured by individual agencies, OSP can
still provide a value-add as an RFP and negotiation resource, helping review solicitations prior to their
release and aiding agency procurement staff in negotiating the most favorable terms for the state. In
addition, OSP can provide accessible, timely training and support for those who work with the
procurement workforce. Because much of the end-to-end procurement process happens outside of
the official procurement office, OSP can act as an advisor to requirements owners, preventing them
from reinventing the wheel, harmonizing standards, and allowing them to offer easy to-access
support. OSP can also launch more robust negotiation training programs with greater market
research indexing and knowledge, and oversee negotiation finalization during the contract evaluation
process, while departments can remain responsible for driving the negotiations with suppliers and
conducting supplier evaluations.
Texas provides a potential best practices model for centralized state procurement, with two main
entities overseeing statewide contracts: The Comptroller of Public Accounts (CPA) for non-IT
commodities and services, and the Department of Information Resources (DIR) for IT commodities
and services. Agencies in Texas with delegated procurement authority are required to either
purchase from vendor lists or cooperative contracts maintained by CPA and DIR and document the
vendors solicited from those resources, or else document and receive approval from their agency
heads to select a non-centralized vendor to award a state contract.
Both CPA and DIR act as training and information resources to aid state agencies in their
procurements. All state agency purchasers must be certified as a Certified Texas Contract Developer
to engage in contract development functions on behalf of a state agency if the employee develops,
evaluates, negotiates, or awards a contract posted on behalf of a state agency.
Additional layers of oversight help ensure contracts in Texas are developed by skilled procurement
professionals and have robust oversight as needed. A multi-agency Contract Advisory Team (CAT)
was created to assist state agencies in improving contract management practices by requiring their
review and recommendations on solicitation documents for contracts that have a value of at least
$5 million. Agencies may additionally request these reviews even if not legislatively mandated. A
similar function exists for IT-related projects with a Quality Assurance Team (QAT) (see more in
Initiatives FUNC-27, FUNC-73). Critically, both entities state outright that review can take up to 30
days. For professional services contracts, including an amendment, modification, renewal, or
extension of the contract exceeding $50,000, agencies in Texas must provide written notice, on a
prescribed form, to a state entity called the Legislative Budget Board, a permanent joint committee
of the Texas Legislature co-chaired by the Lieutenant Governor and the Speaker of the House, within
30 days of the date an agency enters into a contract for professional services.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 88
These functions in Texas enable agencies and by extension, the state, a greater degree of quality
control, pricing, negotiation, and oversight for professional service contracts. While OSP and the
State of Arkansas similarly require centralized purchasing, the non-compliance cited indicates that
policy shifts such as those in Texas could enable a greater degree of oversight and management in
Arkansas for professional service contracts. Legislative changes may be required to enable OSP the
oversight needed to properly establish its authority in reviewing or assisting with certain contracts
prior to issuing a bid or selecting a vendor/entering a contract.
Trust, buy-in, and transparency will be key to this initiative. OSP must reinforce its role as a resource,
not an enforcement entity, to ensure collaboration and not be viewed as simply trying to audit or
“crack down” on departments procurement teams. Establishing metrics for performance for
contract reviews, such as Texas CAT’s 30-day review window, can help agencies trust that any
requests for assistance or mandated reviews will be completed in a timely manner.
Additionally, North Carolina’s IT dashboard provides a potential best practice model for publicly
demonstrating the value of a centralized procurement resource. In August 2023, the North Carolina
Statewide IT Procurement Office within the North Carolina Department of Information Technology
announced a new online reporting process for making available information about its activities
involving IT products and services that are purchased, licensed or leased by state agencies and
participating entities within North Carolina. This dashboard provides monthly reporting metrics “to
provide the highest level of customer service” by more effectively tracking, managing and controlling
operations. These metrics include:
• Cumulative Savings Generated from Abnormal Quantity Threshold Process – by month, fiscal
year to date and cumulative
• Number of active, completed and canceled IT procurements as well as the reported total
value of awarded IT procurements
• Average approval/review cycle time and open approval/review tasks in NC eProcurement –
these two charts track time from all involved in the IT procurement process.
Operationally, Arkansas’s future state procurement organization can be centrally managed with
department-led execution and input. OSP will provide overall direction and support throughout the
procurement process, but activities will be executed at the department level. OSP will maintain
training and standards for the procurement function and manage cross-functional interactions with
support functions.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Include department subject matter experts (SMEs) in the process of best practice research
and rule development re: centralized contracts to address the risk of resistance from these
SMEs in centralization efforts.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 89
• Establish the exceptions process to ensure that overrides of standard specifications are only
permitted in OSP-defined use cases and very infrequently ad hoc to address the risk that
Departments may obtain unwarranted exceptions.
• Craft the centralized service contract specifications alongside most impacted departments
to ensure that products fulfill the needs of state employees to address the risk that
employees may be dissatisfied with the products.
• Establish internal performance metrics for OSP to share with procurement staff, including
number of days it takes to review and issue guidance on a professional services contract.
Recommended steps for optimizing contracts for professional services (future state):
• Implement communications plan re: internal staff understanding upcoming efforts to
improve centralization, benchmarking, and negotiation on service contracts; potential
benefit to state.
• Develop a contract negotiation toolkit (best practices) by engaging contracting experts,
sourcing best practices from state departments and other states, and aligning on contracting
objectives.
• Implement communications plan re: informing state agency procurement staff about shift in
policies to increase centralization of certain contracts including some service contracts, OSP
as training resource and potential benefits to the state.
• Develop standardized policy and procedures for a procurement exception process, involving
state agency SMEs and procurement staff to ensure their buy-in.
• Create and implement a contract evaluation plan to review contracts based on size, strategic
importance, financial impact, and risk level. Prioritize contracts based on factors such as
contract value, expiration date, and supplier relationships.
• Consider IT procurement management software that can provide seamless end-to-end
oversight and monitoring of statewide contracts and can communicate with other digital
procurement platforms/tools.
• Conduct a thorough market analysis to understand current market trends, pricing
benchmarks, and supplier landscape for each contract category.
• Following the guidance in the contract negotiation toolkit, engage key stakeholders from
various departments (finance, legal, operations) to align on contract objectives,
requirements, and negotiation strategies. Ensure clear communication channels and
consensus on negotiation priorities.
• Implement Communications Plan re: vendors and other external stakeholders and OSP’s role
as central resource, new policies related to centralized service contracts.
• Develop a negotiation strategy tailored to each contract, considering factors such as desired
outcomes, negotiation leverage, and potential trade-offs. Determine negotiation tactics,
fallback positions, and alternative options to achieve favorable terms.
• Gather relevant contract data, historical performance metrics, and market intelligence to
inform negotiation positions. Prepare negotiation documents, including RFPs, RFQs, and
contract templates, with clear specifications and evaluation criteria.
• Develop and promulgate OSP performance standards for central procurement function,
including, potentially, measures shared within this initiative (number of trainings
administered, number of contracts voluntarily reviewed).
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 90
• Conduct negotiations emphasizing collaboration, transparency, and mutual value creation.
Use negotiation techniques such as value-based bargaining, cost analysis, and issue
resolution to reach optimal agreements. Document negotiation outcomes, including agreed-
upon terms, concessions, and action items.
• Monitor ongoing impact of renegotiated contracts and adapt as necessary.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: OSP is
committed to “effective, efficient, and ethical procurement.” From the inception of TSS, OSP was
envisioned as the statewide procurement entity to improve contracting through leveraging the state’s
buying power, improving coordination, and eliminating duplication and inconsistency. Implementing
this initiative is aligned with current department priorities, staffing, and resources, however it is
crucial to consider that augmented staffing and resources will be necessary.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial TSS staff analysis
indicates that contract negotiation experts and dedicated engagement from department
procurement leads will be required to implement these recommendations, as well as approximately
$1.1 million in outside negotiation support. IT systems to support management and analysis of
contract are also an estimated need to implement this recommendation, however costs related to
this initiative are reflected in other enabler initiatives.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: TSS and other state department procurement leadership will need to establish policies and
procedures to effectively implement this initiative. A change management plan is essential to outline,
for example, roles, responsibilities, and performance metrics.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to improve statewide contracting for professional services through
negotiation, increased oversight, and better price benchmarking. Recommended performance
measures include:
• Total spending on professional services contracts.
• Average hourly rates for professional services labor.
• Number of centralized professional services contracts overseen by OSP.
• Number of trainings on negotiation administered by OSP.
• Number of professional service procurements OSP is asked to provide guidance on.
• Number of professional services for which OSP provides price/rate benchmarking; and,
• Number of change orders.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: Initial TSS estimates are that this initiative would result in a statewide
savings of $37 million. This savings would be realized within the budgets of multiple departments
(not only at TSS) and is related to assumptions about cost savings related to long tail contract
purchases. To avoid duplication, some of the procurement recommendations are noted as enablers
only.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 91
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across state departments, state leadership, and
with citizens is critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are included for
each audience in Figure 26. Key activities and timing for communication plan are included in
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan.
Figure 26 – FUNC-11 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Department • OSP undertaking joint effort • Leadership • Tanya Freeman
procurement with state agency meetings
leads/staff procurement entities to • Emails
improve tracking of • Town hall style
professional contracts, meeting
increase requirements for
opting out of state contracts,
and improve its training
function, particularly for
negotiations to get the best
value for the state
• Centralized contracting
requirements will be
developed with agency SMEs
and procurement staff to
ensure requirements will
serve agencies well
• State has opportunity to
recognize millions in savings
by improving this area
• OSP as central procurement
resource provide overall
direction and support
throughout the procurement
process, with activities
executed at the department
level. OSP will maintain
training and standards for the
procurement function and
manage cross-functional
interactions with support
functions
Vendors • Arkansas is overhauling how • Social media • TSS
it contracts for certain • Open Communications
services trainings/info Team
• State contracts for certain sessions for the
services are going to become public
more common; vendors will • Vendor list
be appropriately notified of announcement
any changes relevant to • OSP website
contracts coming up for posting
renewal or for invitations to • AR-Buy posting
bid on future contracts
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 92
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
• Improved oversight and
centralization ensures every
vendor has a chance to do
fair business with the state of
Arkansas and make their best
bid
Functional Initiative #25 - Host an OSP roadshow for state departments
This initiative includes hosting an OSP roadshow for state departments to explain the role of OSP,
support OSP provides, how to navigate engaging with OSP, etc. and field feedback from departments.
Initiative Overview and Current State:
The Office of State Procurement (OSP) serves the citizens of Arkansas by ethically, efficiently, and
transparently procuring quality commodities and services for the State. OSP works to make sure
Arkansas Procurement Law and best practices are applied whenever commodities and services for
the various Departments of the State are purchased. Responsibilities of OSP include the following:
• Registers business owners who supply the State with commodities or services.
• Posts opportunities to bid on State contracts.
• Assists State Departments solicit offers for commodities and services.
• Reviews contracts submitted for legislative review; and,
• Manages the State purchase card program.
Policy establishes direction for departments on engaging OSP in procurements, but there is variance
across departments in adherence to established policy, which results in variance in how solicitations
are conducted and insufficient tracking of state contracting, including outcomes and timelines
across the state. Large departments such as DHS often do their own large-scale procurement
activities outside of the centralized OSP function, which may result in duplicative or inefficient
purchasing. State departments are not required to document or gain approval for decisions to not
participate in statewide contracts for the procurement of goods and services, making oversight and
compliance difficult or impossible.
National benchmarking identified several strengths for procurement in Arkansas, including exhibiting
some level of centralization through statewide procurement, policies and process standardization,
and clear separation of roles between source-to-contract and procure-to-pay processes. However,
OSP staff interviews indicate that the division’s role is hindered by the lack of official communication
about OSP and its procurement responsibilities, as well as a need to build trust and accountability
with other departments. There is therefore an opportunity to capitalize on these strengths by
increasing knowledge and adoption of the OSP function, as well as gathering department input on
how it can be improved.
Rationale: OSP seeks to transform how it is viewed by partner departments as a thought partner
to support them in achieving their needs through procurement; not only as a compliance-focused
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 93
entity. OSP has an opportunity to host a roadshow for state departments to explain the role of OSP,
support OSP provides, how to navigate engaging with OSP, and field feedback from departments.
Doing so can increase the adoption of statewide contracts, improve OSP’s functionality, and
increase OSP’s position and visibility as a “customer”-centric organization. This initiative is an
enabling initiative for multiple additional functional initiatives focused on procurement (TSS-11,
FUNC-4, FUNC-11, and FUNC-27)
Implementation Considerations: Implementation of this initiative should be undertaken
in conjunction with other initiatives of Arkansas Forward including TSS-9 “Develop shared services
performance framework,” FUNC-27 “Modify governance process for statewide contracted
commodities,” FUNC-4 “Standardize specifications for long tail purchases,” and TSS-30 “Create an
IT procurement center of excellence” are all initiatives that should be undertaken in conjunction with
this initiative, and efforts to implement these initiatives should be shared and communicated
throughout the roadshow.
During the road show not only can OSP demonstrate and promote its value as a procurement
resource to other departments, but it can also use the facetime to gather input on how it can improve
its offerings and get more agencies to adopt their services and centralized contracts. To ensure the
most value is gained from the roadshow, OSP should develop an evaluation process for the roadshow
and determine the value of hosting the presentations virtually.
This focus on demonstrating customer value should be the focus of the roadshow. OSP should
consider a similar tool to gather data on performance and demonstrate value while on the roadshow.
Such a tool could also be used to track gathered feedback and demonstrate the adoption of
department suggestions.
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan – provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with OSP staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Garner buy-in from cabinet secretaries and have them send a follow-up email to the
roadshow invitation to address the risk that people may not attend the roadshow.
• Conduct a meeting with secretaries and staff following the road show to obtain feedback to
use in developing future outreach initiatives.
• Pursue initiatives that create procurement policy changes that support increased
engagement with OSP and ensure there is adequate follow-up with roadshow attendees to
address the risk that people may not increase engagement following the roadshow.
See related initiatives for additional strategies: Initiatives TSS-9 “Develop shared services
performance framework” FUNC-27 “Modify governance process for statewide contracted
commodities,” FUNC-4 “Standardize specifications for long tail purchases,” and TSS-30 “Create an
IT procurement center of excellence.”
Recommended steps for hosting a OSP road show (future state):
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 94
• Create a presentation with a summary of OSP’s expertise and the ways in which it can serve
as a “thought partner” to departments, how the Office can serve and support departments,
and ways to contact and engage with the Office.
• Create a department schedule with roadshows scheduled to optimize for number of
attendees and departmental synergies (e.g., ensure there are few enough people in the room
to field feedback, group smaller departments together thematically).
• Host roadshows.
• Consolidate feedback from roadshows and integrate into AR Forward initiatives as
appropriate.
• Manage any follow-up from departments and track subsequent engagement with OSP; and,
• Develop KPIs, such as utilization, statewide contracts maintained, statewide contract
performance, and economic impact on the state, and share the progress publicly with
agencies showcase value.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: OSP endeavors
to serve as a statewide resource for procurement in the state. Implementation of this initiative is
aligned with agency priorities and can be absorbed within existing staff and resources.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial staff analysis
indicates OSP staff can implement the provisions of this initiative without substantial one-time cost.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: OSP will need to develop policies and procedures to implement this initiative, including a
process for collecting and acting upon feedback received from stakeholders.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to increase statewide awareness of OSP’s functions and how they can
assist in procurement efforts, including removing redundancies and impediments to state
contracting, leveraging statewide contracts to reduce spend, and otherwise acting as a resource to
improve state contracting. Recommended performance measures include:
• Number of inquiries to OSP.
• Percent of state RFPs posted on ARBuy; and,
• % of Departments complying with centralized shared services procurement requirements.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: No potential savings were identified in relation to this initiative, but it is an
enabling initiative to help TSS realize savings from the related procurement initiatives (TSS-9, FUNC-
27, FUNC-4, TSS-30).
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across state departments, state leadership, and
with community stakeholders is critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities
are included for each audience in Figure 27. Key activities and timing for communication plan are
included in Appendix A – Work Plan.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 95
Figure 27 – FUNC-25 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Executive • OSP is a resource and partner • Leadership • Sec. Leslie
leadership/Cabinet to departments meetings Fisken
secretaries • OSP is working to demonstrate • Individual
what it’s able to do, is building secretary
capacity to better measure its meetings
performance and identify ways
to improve
• Want to collaborate with state
agencies as a service provider,
improve customer relationship
and demonstrate how they can
be of service by conducting
roadshow
• Need to have good attendance
and exposure to build
awareness and help
demonstrate utility
Department • OSP wants to build awareness • Road show • Tanya
procurement offices of how it can help state Freeman
agencies contract to get the • OSP/TSS
best value for agencies and Comms
the state team
• OSP wants to hear from
procurement staff how they
can be a better resource
• OSP works for you
Functional Initiative #27 - Modify governance process for statewide
contracted commodities
This initiative modifies the governance process for statewide contracted commodities to require
purchase on contract, ultimately to leverage pooled demand and secure better rates.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Office of State Procurement (OSP) has
primary responsibility and oversight for the Statewide procurement of commodities, technical and
professional services for all state agencies, boards and commissions and colleges and universities.
OSP also provides training in Arkansas procurement laws, regulations, and policies.
During Arkansas Forward benchmarking, it was revealed that less than 10% of the $1.7B targeted
spending is currently conducted through statewide contracts, limiting potential to leverage scale as
a procurement advantage. Furthermore, only two OSP managers oversee all statewide contracts,
limiting the organization’s capacity for strategic category management. Mandatory contracts are
seldom used across the procurement organization and little precedent exists for review and
syndication processes. OSP is intended to be a centralized procurement function for procurements
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 96
of a certain size, but OSP staff do not feel they have sufficient authority or power to enforce this
policy.
OSP staff indicate that agencies do their own solicitations and that there is insufficient tracking of
state contracting, including outcomes and timelines across the state. Large departments such as
DHS often do their own large-scale procurement activities outside of the centralized OSP function.
Other departments negotiate contract terms after the award of the contract. While OSP maintains a
qualified vendor list, many vendors do not have rates listed, and state departments are not required
to utilize this list, nor are there requirements that departments document whether they posted
solicitation bids with the list or document why a qualified vendor was not selected for a bid. OSP
indicates other departments have diverse methods of procurement, and there is no standardization
in pricing for statewide commodities contracts, which leads to irregularity across departments for
the provision of common items.
There is also inconsistency in how contracting policies are interpreted and applied by department
procurement staff and OSP, creating confusion and limiting uniformity and predictability across the
state contracting enterprise. This unpredictability and inconsistency hurt the state’s ability to
negotiate the best rates and obtain best value from vendors, particularly as the state aims to gain
efficiency by doing more statewide contracting. Procurement staff workflow is also negatively
impacted by the inconsistency, unpredictability, and lack of uniformity that come from policy being
interpreted and implemented differently.
Such decentralization in commodities contracts limits Arkansas’ ability to achieve an enterprise level
perspective of commodities spending, missing opportunities to appropriately group and categorize
commodity spending across departments. Through this decentralized approach, the State is missing
opportunities to potentially scale common commodities purchases across the enterprise.
Rationale: By increasing standardization and pooling procurement across state agencies, OSP
can improve commodities purchasing, which can help the State realize cost savings through
standardized price points/requirements and reducing inconsistencies.
Improving the management of demand for vendors and support includes optimizing spend volumes
across the largest commodity spend categories, including IT commodities (e.g., laptops, software
licenses, and broadband); office space and property leases and rentals; and medical, education,
equipment, and administrative services and commodities. By focusing on consolidating contracts
for commodities and services and enhancing the rigor negotiations for major solicitations to achieve
better rates and terms across this initiative and others, it is estimated that Arkansas could realize
approximately $102 million in value annually.
To achieve the future state vision, OSP must gain insight into the number of commodities contracts
that exist currently outside of the statewide procurement system. Arkansas must standardize
product categorization and taxonomies across departments for these contracts and create category
strategies; this effort can help identify which commodities should be sourced via statewide contracts
moving forward.
Washington’s Department of Enterprise Services (DES) utilizes a statewide contract system, but if a
statewide contract cannot fulfill a state agency’s needs, the agency may purchase from a vendor that
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 97
is not on contract with the state and document the reason. DES reviews these decisions during a
“delegation of authority process,” in which DES completes procurement risk assessments (PRA).
Recently, 9 stakeholders and DES agreed that the procurement risk assessment using the DES PRA
Tool was too cumbersome and time-consuming, and a statewide effort for creating a new tool and
process was initiated, beginning with a workshop in April 2024 where DES obtained feedback from
stakeholders on how the procurement assessment could be improved. Their process resulted in a
procurement risk assessment that is clearly defined so that agencies will better understand the
purpose of the process, tools, and how agency information will be used as DES conducts the
assessments. Moving forward, the agency plans to use a new process centered around conducting
contract audits to determine procurement delegation risk.
DES published a 2024 Procurement Risk Assessment Implementation Project Plan to outline the
improvements planned for their process, including goals, a business objective and plan for achieving
that objective, expected benefits, and approach (including schedules for iterations of the
implementation plan). The plan also identifies Key Stakeholders and Performance Measures. The
table below in Figure 28 outlines some of these details.
Figure 28 – Washington State Procurement Delegation Tool Project Plan Highlights
• External risk assessment process improvement (i.e. from the customer’s
perspective).
• Internal risk assessment process improvement (i.e. enhanced efficiencies).
Project Goals • More clearly define and communicate how the risk assessment is
administered so that agencies will better understand the process and how
DES will use the information we collect.
• Better meet agency business needs, while balancing procurement risk,
resulting in a reduced number of additional delegation of authority requests.
• Improve customer satisfaction with the process.
Business objective • Properly assess agency strengths and weaknesses as they relate to
procurement activities.
• Capitalize on 10 years of procurement risk assessment experience and data
collection.
• Determine appropriate delegation authority for each agency.
• Greater focus on supplier diversity and environmental purchasing policies
compliance. 5. Provide meaningful oversight.
Expected benefits • DES will have a reliable method with which to determine delegated authority
and oversight measures which will right-size delegations.
• Agencies will have a positive experience, where value is added, as the new
process will minimize duplicative work on behalf of the agency and DES.
• Identify trends and gaps that may highlight risk areas of focus each cycle
• Allows agencies to conduct their own procurements where able and provides
expert assistance as needed and appropriate
• Reduce the amount of additional delegation of authority requests
9
Washington Department of Enterprise Services, “2024 Procurement Risk Assessment Implementation
Project Plan,” https://des.wa.gov/sites/default/files/2024-07/procurement-risk-assessment-
implementation-plan.pdf.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 98
• Assess agencies’ progress in implementing the supplier diversity and
environmental purchasing policies by benchmarking agency compliance with
the policies.
• Oversight will focus on higher risk agencies and to help agencies reduce risk,
eliminate weaknesses, and utilize expertise to achieve improvements.
Key Stakeholders • Procurement personnel in the 105 agencies that have previously completed
the PRA.
• All other procurement personnel that rely on relevant procurement statute
and DES procurement policies, procedures, and guidance.
• State executive and financial managers
• Washington State Legislature
• Vendor community
Performance Measures • Stakeholder responses to post-risk assessment survey.
• Agency compliance with overall enterprise procurement policies
• Reduction in additional delegation of authority requests
• Reduction in agency risk profiles.
DES’ implementation plan for the new procurement risk assessment process is includes resourcing
the team appropriately to ensure successful implementation, conducting outreach to internal and
external stakeholders regarding the new process, providing to all agencies a communication
regarding the new PRA process, and a new Contract Audit Rubric template.
Beginning with 3-6 contracts per agency, DES plans to audit contracts based on certain risk factors,
including a substantial lack of compliance with procurement laws and policies (based on past
practices, state auditor findings, and more) and high-profile procurements (i.e. high dollar value,
visibility, regulatory environment, type of commodity/service, complex procurements, etc.). DES will
then assess compliance with procurement policies and assign “pass/fail” for meeting the defined
thresholds for each policy. The number of “pass/fail” findings will then lead to delegated authority
results. Figure 29 below is the table indicating how results of these planned audits will affect
procurement delegation authority in the future.
Figure 29 – Delegated Authority Analysis
As reprinted from: Washington State Department of Enterprise Services, 2024.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 99
Arkansas may consider a similar process for identifying agencies procuring commodities outside of
statewide contracts; designing a tool or metric to determine categories of commodities or agencies
with risky contracts or contracts that are high dollar and could be contained considerably by
leveraging the state’s buying power. Importantly, the process undertaken by DES involved 1)
adequately resourcing the contracting team implementing this risk assessment and delegation
analysis; 2) from the outset, involving key stakeholders to learn how they could improve their
process; and 3) outlining goals and key performance measures to validate and demonstrate their
value as a centralized contracting agency for state agencies and vendors alike.
OSP must also identify current policy and/or operational barriers that are preventing agencies from
abiding by current statewide contract requirements and motivating them to seek exceptions
frequently. OSP can then implement guidelines for mandatory contracts for commodity spend
categories, with a process for legislative review and syndication, while also seeking approval of policy
changes to improve statewide commodity contracting moving forward.
In the future state outlined in the Arkansas Forward Strategic Procurement Plan, needs analysis will
be primarily owned by departments with guidance provided by OSP. However, for prioritized
categories, based on criticality, scale or other identified value opportunities, OSP will provide greater
governance and support. In most instances, departments will be responsible for tracking demand for
department-specific items, whereas OSP will track demand for state-wide commodities and
services. By modifying the governance for these commodities, Arkansas can ensure that this future
state has the proper guardrails and policies in place to ensure more standardized price
points/requirements and reduced inconsistencies.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Ensure comprehensiveness of training materials, require policy comprehension assessment
for procurement employees, and host formal office hours opportunities to field questions to
mitigate the risk that policy changes may not be effectively implemented because they are
not understood.
• Outline potential cost benefits of policy changes and speak on complementary initiatives
that will enhance planning capabilities and help reduce the need for emergency
procurements to mitigate risk that policy changes may not be approved for fear of reducing
purchasing efficiency.
Recommended steps for implementing modified commodities purchasing (future state):
• Conduct review of current procurement purchasing requirements and mandatory statewide
contracts, identifying instances of price leakage and non-conformity to contracts (mandatory
and non-mandatory)
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 100
• Conduct review of Washington State model and determine whether to develop risk-based
tool for review
• Outline necessary policy changes to increase purchase on statewide contract and identify
the approving bodies who would need to finalize policy changes
• Implement communications plan re: procurement staff at agencies to involve them in policy
development, including when to seek exceptions; negotiate policy changes
• Present proposed policy changes to approving bodies
• Develop training materials to support policy changes
• Notify departments of policy changes, deploy trainings, and field questions from affected
employees
• Monitor ongoing impact of transitioned roles and adapt as necessary
• Develop standardized policy and procedures for a procurement exception process
• Consider IT procurement management software
• Examine contract management software options
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: OSP is
committed to “effective, efficient, and ethical procurement.” From the inception of TSS, OSP was
envisioned as the statewide procurement entity to improve contracting through leveraging the state’s
buying, improving coordination, and eliminating duplication and inconsistency. Implementing this
initiative is aligned with current department priorities, staffing, and resources; however, it is crucial
to consider that augmented staffing and resources may be necessary.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial TSS staff analysis
indicates that no additional staffing or IT will be needed to implement this initiative beyond existing
legal experts in procurement, who are currently on staff. However, depending on the complexity of
the solution implemented to maximize efficiency and effectiveness opportunities under this
initiative, additional staff and IT may be needed.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: TSS and other state agency procurement leadership will need to establish policies and
procedures to effectively implement this initiative. A change management plan is essential to outline,
for example, roles, responsibilities, and performance metrics.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
Recommended performance measures include:
• Percent of total purchases on statewide contracts;
• Number of statewide contracts; and,
• Total procurement spending on commodities.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: No potential savings were identified directy related to this initiative; in the
effort to prevent “double counting” of savings, this initiative has been identified as an important
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 101
enabling practice that will allow Arkansas to achieve expected savings from the group of initiatives
related to contracting.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across state agency procurement staff and state
leadership is critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are included for each
audience in Figure 30. Key activities and timing for communication plan are included in Appendix A
– TSS Work Plan.
Figure 30 – FUNC-27 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Agency procurement • OSP undertaking joint effort • Leadership • Jessica
leads/staff with state agency meetings Patterson
procurement entities to • Emails • Tanya
increase efficiency of state • Town hall style Freeman
purchasing with a focus on meeting
commodities purchases
• OSP seeks to serve as a
resource for state contracting
and to help eliminate
duplication, save agencies
money and time on
commodities contracts
• Collaboration critical to help
identify these contracts;
centralizing the contracts can
result in significant savings
and efficiencies for state, but
centralization will not occur
without the input and
guidance of agency SMEs
State leadership • OSP’s role as a centralized • Meetings with • Jessica
(Governor’s Office, contracting authority is legislators, Patterson
Legislature) hindered by current Governor’s policy (TSS); Tanya
policies/statute that does not staff Freeman
give OSP proper enforcement
or oversight functions; need
statutory or budgetary
changes to fully realize the
potential of the agency as a
statewide procurement entity
Vendors • Arkansas seeks to be a • Social media • Jessica
premier state to do business in • Open Patterson
and welcomes opportunities trainings/info (TSS) and
for competitive pricing on sessions for the Tanya
commodities public Freeman
• Arkansas wants to find • Vendor list
scalable commodity announcement
purchases to leverage the • OSP website
state’s buying power and posting
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 102
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
eliminative duplication of • AR-Buy posting
efforts across agencies
• New process will help vendors
better understand how to
compete for Arkansas
business and show value add
for both vendors and the state
Functional Initiative #41 - Consolidate Little Rock office space in line with
metro area
This initiative focuses on reducing office footprint and real estate cost in Little Rock by moving
departments from leased space into existing owned space; consolidating departments into one
location if possible, exiting all (or nearly all) private leases, selling underutilized buildings after
consolidation, and subleasing remaining space no longer needed where space cannot be sold or
lease cannot be terminated to reduce overall office space footprint and spend
Initiative Overview and Current State:
The Arkansas Forward effort has developed the State’s first comprehensive view of its combined
owned and leased real estate portfolio. The State has a currently documented real estate portfolio of
approximately 11.8M square feet (approximately 5.5M of which is office space). Of this, 3.3M square
feet of office space are in Little Rock (319 SF/FTE) and 2.2M are outside Little Rock (279 SF/FTE). TSS’
Division of Building Authority (DBA) Real Estate Section is the is the leasing agent for all state
agencies and has oversight for the purchase and sale of real property for most state agencies. The
agency’s mission is to provide transparent oversight and knowledgeable guidance for state agency
capital improvements and real estate acquisitions.
Within Little Rock, 2.4m square feet (approximately 75%) of office space is owned, while outside
Little Rock, 80% of office space is leased. From a strategic perspective, there is little overarching or
long-term analysis to optimize the portfolio as a whole for the needs of the state. Many buildings are
operating at only partial occupancy, with spaces not optimized to the current way of working or needs
of the organization. This is not only fiscally inefficient, but also can create cultural issues within
organizations as well. For example, in interviews with Parks, Heritage, and Tourism staff, they noted
“Physical separation drives cultural distinctions, meaning different approaches are applied across
divisions for services like fleet and IT.”
TSS currently manages a statewide portfolio, including some buildings with extended leases. There
is little, if any, co-location of departments in the same buildings in many communities, creating
inefficiencies in the use of space the state/DBA currently leases and creating multiple locations to
which customers must visit to conduct government business. Currently, there is a moratorium on
capital investments or movements for all state agencies.
Analyses and departmental input have highlighted several effectiveness and efficiency challenges:
• Little Rock has roughly double the footprint required to achieve SF/FTE benchmarks; and,
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 103
• Departments are not required or encouraged to share information about space availability or
land use with DBA.
Rationale: This initiative focuses on reducing the office footprint and real estate cost in Little Rock
by moving departments from leased space into existing owned space; consolidating departments
into one location if possible, exiting all (or nearly all) private leases, selling underutilized buildings
after consolidation, and subleasing remaining space no longer needed where space cannot be sold
or lease cannot be terminated to reduce overall office space footprint and spend. The initial focus
will be on cabinet secretary departments.
Benchmarking analysis revealed $15-25M in savings opportunity across four dimensions.
Consolidating Little Rock office space could save $10M-20M annually by increasing occupancy in
Little Rock office space from approximately 320 SF/FTE to 200 SF/FTE and exiting leases and/or
selling buildings. Optimizing the statewide network could save $3M-6M annually by consolidating
non-Little Rock office space within and between towns to reach 225 SF/FTE and exiting leases and/or
selling buildings. Consolidation would also involve considerations of updating work spaces and
enhancing them to improve employee experience.
In addition to cost savings, consolidating space has the potential to improve customer experiences
by reducing the number of state buildings required to visit to conduct government business.
Implementation Considerations:
Consolidating office space within Little Rock includes several considerations to be implemented
successfully, many of them having to do with stakeholders. First, while cabinet secretary
departments will be the initial focus of the consolidation, discussion with non-cabinet departments
should also be considered for co-location. Second, there is the potential for opposition to a
reduction in the state footprint from the private sector and local governments. Private industry,
economic development entities, and the Little Rock Chamber of Commerce are critical partners to
involve in discussion and implementation at the outset of the implementation.
Staff who are re-located will also need to be considered. Physical separation, as indicated above,
created different office cultures among offices. A change management must take into consideration
the cultures of the offices that are being moved, for example, whether an office is family-oriented,
holds employee events, or what needs might exist for privacy/confidentiality in different offices.
DBA and the State will also need to consider the resources necessary to successfully implement this
consolidation of staff, including lease management software. Building data (e.g., allocated FTEs,
utilization, space design) availability and accuracy are key enablers to understand the current state
of the portfolio and space utilization in Little Rock, and to track impacts from initiatives as they are
implemented. Additionally, DBA should be empowered to manage or meaningfully influence real
estate portfolio decisions. An empowered, centralized real estate function can help ensure a
cohesive strategy, fiscal responsibility of state spending, and consistency across the portfolio.
Finally, securing senior state government leadership sponsorship, including Governor’s Office and
secretaries will be important to ensure full organizational support.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 104
The State can implement activities across four behavioral influences, as demonstrated in other areas
of the Arkansas Forward documentation, to ensure the initiatives, and change program overall, are
successful. Below are three that can support this initiative.
• Understanding and conviction: DBA will communicate the benefits of the statewide real
estate management approach, showing the value both to departments and citizens.
Additionally, the department will gather feedback from staff on existing pain points with
respect to facilities and utilize that information in developing and iterating on the future space
management plans. This community input helps foster a collaborative environment where all
stakeholders feel ownership of the ultimate plan.
• Formal reinforcement mechanisms: DBA will track several KPIs, such as utilization, energy
saved, maintenance spend, and economic impact on the community, and share the progress
publicly with staff and the community to celebrate achievement.
• Role modeling: The real estate function will identify leaders and encourage them to signal
their support for the effort.
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Strongly minimize investment in redesign and product purchases until a broader plan is
developed to address the risk that efficiency of space design is sacrificed, and the old ways
of space utilization are accepted as the norm.
• Craft the specifications alongside most impacted departments to ensure that the new
working environments fulfill the needs of state employees to address the risk that employees
are dissatisfied with space consolidation.
• Develop a proactive, continuous cadence of updates for Legislative offices to keep them
informed about the development of this initiative.
Recommended steps for consolidating Little Rock office space (future state):
• Conduct space plan assessments and departmental interviews to identify relocation and
consolidation opportunities.
• Consolidate opportunities into a recommended plan.
• Syndicate consolidation opportunities with department leadership and the Governor’s Office
and obtain approval for the plan and timeline.
• For impacted departments, identify project manager to collaborate with DBA on details of
any planned moves.
• Discuss with non-cabinet departments opportunities for co-locating.
• Implement communications plan: engage private sector, legislators, and local government
to explain consolidation, promote transparency, gather input, and obtain buy-in.
• Establish KPIs for the project (see proposed below).
• Consider lease management software options.
• Confirm headcount, adjacency requirements, and space utilization/design.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 105
• Create standards and monitoring plan for footprint and office needs.
• Determine the needs of each office; gather feedback from staff on existing pain points with
respect to facilities and utilize that information in developing and iterating on the future space
management plans.
• Implement Communications Plan: make department announcements about
consolidation/offices moves; tout benefits
• Engage furniture installer to confirm product availability and schedule modifications.
• Engage DBA Design Review for construction drawings for permanent wall improvements,
space design for pricing.
• Meet DBA Maintenance Manager and on-call architects at affected sites to discuss
improvements and tentative schedule for construction estimating and start.
• Develop and evaluate seating arrangement options and product availability/purchases;
make purchases according to final decisions.
• Phased rollout: Complete construction/renovation of building modifications.
• Phased rollout: Move relevant departments to new spaces as building renovations are
finalized and support logistics of the move.
• Monitor ongoing impact and adapt KPIs, such as utilization, energy saved, maintenance
spend, and economic impact on the community, and share the progress publicly with staff
and the community to celebrate achievement. as necessary.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: DBA’s mission
is providing transparent oversight and knowledgeable guidance for state department capital
improvements and real estate acquisitions. Implementing this initiative is aligned with current
department priorities and staffing.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial DBA staff analysis
indicates that designated DBA team member capacity will be necessary to implement this initiative.
Lease Management software may also be necessary. DBA estimates a one-time cost of $16 million
is anticipated for moving costs statewide related to FUNC-41 and 49. New or moved workstations
will require data and electrical connections will also be required.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: Significant change management will be required to implement this initiative, including
developing communication plans for impacted staff, local government, and private industry in Little
Rock. Policies and protocols for co-location, remote/hybrid work will also need to be developed.
Policies developed for consolidated office space will need to take into account employee feedback.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to reduce inefficiencies in state leasing of office space and realize
savings and improved customer experience. Recommended performance measures include:
• The number of square feet reduced from Little Rock footprint.
• Average cost/square foot for leases in Little Rock.
• Percent of DBA-managed properties serving 2 or more departments.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 106
• Total building maintenance in Little Rock; and,
• Customer satisfaction with co-located office space.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: DBA anticipates a recurring positive fiscal impact of $14 million annually
is expected as a result of this initiative from a shift to lower cost leases and a reduction in the Little
Rock footprint, as well as co-location in additional facilities.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across state agencies, state leadership, and with
community stakeholders is critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are
included for each audience in Figure 31. Key activities and timing for communication plan are
included in Appendix A – TSS Work Plan.
Figure 31 – FUNC-41 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Affected staff • Benefits of the statewide • Departmental • Department
real estate management emails Secretary/Division
approach, showing the • DBA statewide Leader
value of co-locating, virtual • Chris Bell
consolidating space. meeting or
• Detailed timeline of moves roadshow
and instructions for their
packing and moving
Private industry and • Demonstrate how co- • Individual • Chris Bell
non-governmental location and creating more meetings on a
stakeholders centralized government regular basis
functions can help bring • Emails
business to area
• Will involve early on in
process and make aware of
planned changes early on
Local government • Demonstrate how co- • Individual • Chris Bell
location and creating more meetings on a
centralized government regular basis
functions can help bring • Emails
business to area
• Will involve early on in
process and make aware of
planned changes early on
Public • Communication of new • Website • Chris Bell
office locations for public- updates
facing facilities should • Press release
occur in advance and in affected
following the moves communities
• The goal of the location is
to create benefits to the
public related to co-
location
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 107
Functional Initiative #49 - Consolidate statewide office space outside of
Little Rock
This initiative focuses on reducing office footprint and real estate cost outside of Little Rock by
moving departments from leased space into existing owned space, consolidating departments into
one location if possible, exiting all (or nearly all) private leases, selling underutilized buildings after
consolidation, and subleasing remaining space no longer needed where space cannot be sold or
lease cannot be terminated.
Initiative Overview and Current State:
As noted in FUNC-41, Arkansas currently owns or leases 11.8 million square feet (SF) of space across
the state. Of that, 5.5 million square feet are used as office space: 3.3m SF in Little Rock and 2.2m
SF outside Little Rock. Within Little Rock, 2.4m SF (approximately 75%) of office space is owned,
while outside Little Rock, 80% of office space is leased. From a strategic perspective, there is little
overarching or long-term analysis to optimize the portfolio as a whole for the needs of the state. Many
buildings are operating at only partial occupancy.
Rationale: This initiative is focused on a reduction of the State’s office footprint and real estate
cost outside of Little Rock by moving departments from leased space into existing owned space,
consolidating departments into one location if possible, exiting all (or nearly all) private leases,
selling underutilized buildings after consolidation, and subleasing remaining space no longer
needed where space cannot be sold or a lease cannot be terminated.
Benchmarking analysis revealed $15-25M in savings opportunity across four dimensions. Optimizing
the statewide network could save $3M-6M annually by consolidating non-Little Rock office space
within and between towns to reach 225 SF/FTE and exiting leases and/or selling buildings.
Consolidation would also involve considerations of updating work spaces and enhancing them to
improve employee experience.
In addition to cost savings, consolidating space has the potential to improve customer experiences
by reducing the number of state buildings required to visit to conduct government business. In
addition, the effort to consolidate office space may result in updating outdated office spaces and
otherwise improving the workplace experience for department employees.
Implementation Considerations: This initiative is the companion to FUNC-41. Appendix
A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for implementation of
this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through interviews and work
sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• The same risks are expected as in FUNC-41, but given that the location is outside Little Rock,
there could be more significant response from communities about changes to the State’s real
estate footprint, given the impact of state leases within rural communities. This will
necessitate collaboration, transparency, and ongoing dialogue with community stakeholders
such as local chambers of commerce and others in the affected areas.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 108
• To reiterate, this initiative in particular will benefit from the development of a proactive,
continuous cadence of updates for Legislative offices to keep them informed.
Recommended steps for consolidating office space outside of Little Rock (future state):
• Secure lease-management and space-planning software and complete setup and data
integration
• Conduct space plan assessments and departmental interviews to identify relocation and
consolidation opportunities
• Take space plan to legislative review with goal of creating enthusiasm and local buy-in
• Syndicate consolidation opportunities with department leadership and the Governor’s Office
and develop consolidation plan and timeline
• Discuss with non-cabinet departments opportunities for co-locating.
• Implement communications plan: engage private sector, legislators, and local government
to explain consolidation, promote transparency, gather input, and obtain buy-in
• Establish KPIs and performance tracking capabilities
• Confirm headcount, adjacency requirements, and space utilization/design
• Create standards and monitoring plan for footprint and office needs
• Determine needs of each office; gather feedback from staff on existing pain points with
respect to facilities and utilize that information in developing and iterating on the future space
management plans
• Implement Communications Plan: make agency announcements about
consolidation/offices moves; tout benefits
• Engage furniture installer to confirm product availability and schedule modifications
• Engage DBA Design Review for construction drawings for permanent wall improvements,
space design for pricing
• Meet landlord at affected sites to discuss improvements and tentative schedule for
construction estimating and start
• Develop and evaluate seating arrangement options and product availability/purchases;
make purchases according to final decisions
• Phased rollout: Complete construction/renovation of building modifications
• Phased rollout: Move relevant departments to new spaces as building renovations are
finalized and support logistics of the move
• Monitor ongoing impact and adapt KPIs, such as utilization, energy saved, maintenance
spend, and economic impact on the community, and share the progress publicly with staff
and the community to celebrate achievement. as necessary
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: DBA’s mission
is providing transparent oversight and knowledgeable guidance for state agency capital
improvements and real estate acquisitions. Implementing this initiative is aligned with current
department priorities and staffing.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial DBA staff analysis
indicates that designated DBA team member capacity will be necessary to implement this initiative.
Lease Management software may also be necessary. DBA estimates a one-time cost of $16 million
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 109
is anticipated for moving costs statewide related to FUNC-41 and 49. New or moved workstations
will require data and electrical connections will also be required.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: Significant change management will be required to implement this initiative, including
developing communication plans for impacted staff, local government, and private industry across
the state. Policies and protocols for co-location, remote/hybrid work will also need to be developed.
Policies developed for consolidated office space will need to consider employee feedback.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to reduce inefficiencies in state leasing of office space and realize
savings and improved customer experience. Recommended performance measures include:
• The number of square feet reduced from state footprint.
• Average cost/square foot for leases outside Little Rock.
• Percent of DBA-managed properties serving 2 or more departments.
• Total building maintenance outside Little Rock; and,
• Customer satisfaction with co-located office space.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: TSS analysis indicates there is a potential recurring positive fiscal impact
of $5 million for this initiative.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across state departments, state leadership, and
with community stakeholders is critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities
are included for each audience in Figure 32. Key activities and timing for communication plan are
included in Appendix A – TSS Work Plan.
Figure 32 – FUNC-49 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Affected staff • Benefits of the statewide • Departmental • Department
real estate management emails Secretary/Division
approach, showing the • DBA statewide Leader
value of co-locating, virtual • Chris Bell
consolidating space. meeting or
Detailed timeline of moves roadshow
and instructions for their
packing and moving
Private industry • Demonstrate how co- • Individual • Chris Bell
location and creating more meetings on a
centralized government regular basis
functions can help bring • Emails
business to area
• Will involve early on in
process and make aware of
planned changes early on
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 110
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Local government • Demonstrate how co- • Individual • Chris Bell
location and creating more meetings on a
centralized government regular basis
functions can help bring • Emails
business to area
• Will involve early on in
process and make aware of
planned changes early on
Functional Initiative #60 - Collaborate across statewide operational
excellence/customer experience (CX) roles
This initiative seeks to improve coordination among operational excellence and Arkansan experience
roles across the state and assess opportunities for centralized reporting structures to create
accountability across departments and disseminate best practices for increased efficiency.
Initiative Overview and Current State: TSS has an established leadership role in driving
both operational excellence and improved citizen experience. TSS is leading an effort to create the
Arkansas Government Portal, a statewide technology solution that will improve citizen experience
across all domains of government, while resulting in a positive operational impact through reduced
in-bound contacts. This project illustrates the potential for TSS to drive improvements to operations
and citizen experience on behalf of Arkansans.
As noted in TSS-36 and TSS-39, TSS has been working to develop a first-in-the nation portal where
citizens can access over 1,200 services across over 15 departments and other agencies. TSS is in the
process of soliciting information from qualified contractors to develop, test, and implement its
portal, with responsibilities to include managing, supporting, overseeing the enrollment of the overall
Government Services Portal solution, and establishing standards and requirements for Arkansas
state departments and other entities that want to engage with the Government Services Portal
program. The larger data hub project that TSS is working on is with a non-profit conglomerate of large
employers and states and it is called Research Improving People’s Lives (RIPL). RIPL identifies
partners such as, the National Governors Association, Social Security Administration, Google,
Walmart, and the states of Rhode Island, Virginia, and Colorado.
Improvements to customer experience are important priorities for multiple departments. In fact,
several Arkansas Forward departmental strategic plans concern improving the quality of services
provided to Arkansans to improve their experience of government services and drive greater
customer satisfaction. The Department of Human Services (DHS) is designing a new Contact Service
Center to enhance its ability to meet the needs of individuals and families in the community through
improved technology and communication methods (DHS-2). DHS seeks to deploy a more holistic
approach to meet the needs of its beneficiaries.
As another example, the Department of Finance and Administration is seeking to improve the digital
customer experience as well as the experience of in-office service delivery through multiple
initiatives, including:
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 111
• DFA-8 – Map and enhance DMV processes with technology to improve speed and service
• DFA-9 – Update DFA website to increase customer satisfaction and increase efficiency
• DFA-11 – Implement customer-centered tax auditor training within the Division of Field Audit
at DFA to enhance cooperation
• DFA-14 – Create a single sign-on licensing portal with direct document upload
• DFA-18 – Map DFA processes, identify issues, and improve efficiency and satisfaction
• DFA-23 – Create response management system to decrease response times and increase
accuracy of information
• DFA-44 – Train all DFA employees on customer experience standards
Rationale: This initiative focuses on improving coordination among operational excellence and
Arkansan experience roles across the state and assessing opportunities for centralized reporting
structures in order to create accountability across departments and disseminate best practices for
increased efficiency.
Operational Excellence
Other state examples are instructive as to how Arkansas can drive operational improvement through
TSS. During Indiana’s 2005 centralization effort of Performance Management, Strategic Hiring and
Position Management, Talent Acquisition, Benefits and Healthcare, among other functions, the
Governor’s newly created Government Efficiency and Financial Planning Unit immediately began
work with the Governor to establish goals for each state agency department and develop a system
for monitoring progress. Over fifteen months, the Governor’s office conducted performance
evaluations of all state agencies and inventoried the state’s operations. The information collected
showed only 38% of departments collected data on their operations and that siloed program
management within each agency created overlap and duplication. Following this initial
benchmarking process, agency heads were invited to collaborate on new performance measures to
which they would be held accountable.
Another example of how states can improve operational excellence is Washington State. Through the
as Harvard Kennedy School’s Operational Excellence project, best practices related to government
operational excellence were collected, including a 2017 case study on Washington State. 10
In 2013, Governor Jay Inslee instituted an initiative called “Results Washington,” in which he
identified five top-priority statewide goals he challenged state agency leaders to tackle, tracking their
progress and applying lean thinking and tools to improve their processes. Lean process is a business
methodology that aims to eliminate waste from processes and focus on delivering value to
customers. A study of Washington’s results under this initiative showed $4.50 in value to taxpayers
is returned for every $1 invested in the lean process improvement program. A total of $33 million in
savings and avoided costs were recognized in Washington, as well as several efficiencies through
10
Kennedy School, 2017, “Performance Management and Lean Process Improvement - Results Washington,
An Operational Excellence in Government Success Story,”
https://hwpi.harvard.edu/files/datasmart/files/case-study-results-washington-performance-management-
lean.pdf?m=1631281241.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 112
improvements in process and services. The 2017 Harvard study highlights the following from this
initiative:
• One million hours of time saved waiting in Department of Licensing lobbies using process
improvements and partnering with private driver-training schools.
• 15% decrease in speed-related deaths.
• 20% faster processing of DNA tests at the Crime Lab, reducing the backlog by 10 percent and
cutting staff overtime 56%.
• $6.2 million in recovered overpayments from Department of Labor and Industries, a 28-
percent increase in one year; and,
• $2.3 million in savings a year on long-distance phone calls.
This study indicates the value operational excellence can yield for states, and Washington’s
framework for Results Washington may be of value in developing such an initiative in Arkansas.
Customer Experience
A 2022 McKinsey & Company “State-of-the-States” survey also establishes a strong link between
customer experience and resident satisfaction and illustrated that customer experience
improvements can have tremendous benefits for government agencies and their staff and
stakeholders (summarized in Figure 33).
Figure 33 – Benefits to State Agencies from Improving Customer Experience
Source: McKinsey & Company, 2022.
Operational excellence has a critical role to play in how citizens perceive state government efficiency
and effectiveness and their level of satisfaction with their government. As such, it is an important
focus for governments like Arkansas looking to improve the resident experience.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 113
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Provide detailed explanations for changes to organization and process, extensive training,
and support from leadership to ensure buy-in and adoption of changes to address the risk
there could be interdepartmental coordination issues.
• Prioritize use cases that are the most cost-efficient and leverage best practices from other
IT initiatives to keep cost of new IT systems and capabilities to a minimum to address the
risk that Operational excellence programs could require IT capabilities that have large setup
costs.
Recommended steps collaborating across statewide operational excellence/CX roles (future
state):
• Conduct a detailed current state assessment of OpEx and customer experience by
department, to include collection of customer experience data/ratings, in-flight initiatives or
programs, and staffing resources/organizations.
• In analyzing assessment results, identify opportunities for creation of a center of excellence
model (TSS has resources and disseminates best practices and training) vs. a consolidation
of responsibility at TSS.
• Assess existing staff resources and identify staffing needs (e.g., project managers with Six
Sigma training, leader with customer experience). Identify if needs can be met within state
resources or if a consultant resource is needed.
• Identify other departmental resources for both operational excellence and CX.
• Form two workgroups, to be chaired by TSS, to promote information sharing and
collaboration (consisting of TSS staff and departmental resources).
• Identify key areas for improvement and develop toolkits, resources, and training to support
departmental improvement.
Once operational and experience improvement initiatives are identified:
• Implement necessary supporting technologies to track, analyze, and visualize KPIs.
• Develop detailed documentation of process and organizational changes.
• Pilot operational excellence programs across select key departments and gather feedback.
• Communicate organizational changes and train employees.
• Monitor ongoing impact of coordination/centralization and adapt as necessary.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: TSS is
recognized as the administrative arm of Arkansas state government with a primary focus to identify
efficiencies and cost-saving measures to streamline operations while providing optimal service to
the state. Implementation of this initiative at TSS is aligned with department priorities, staffing, and
resources and fills a critical need in supporting other departments in implementing customer
experience and operational excellence solutions.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial TSS staff analysis
indicates that operational excellence leadership with expertise in coordination and reporting
structures will be necessary to implement this initiative. IT Systems to track performance, such as
PowerBI or Tableau will also be required. TSS currently has enterprise contracts with both vendors.
Costs for implementation depend on whether centralization of any functions is necessary.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 114
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: TSS and other departments will need to establish policies and procedures to effectively
implement this initiative. A change management plan is essential to outline, for example, changes to
effectuate operational excellence, reporting structures, performance metrics, and how agencies will
utilize metrics to drive improvement.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to increase and improve statewide shared services. Recommended
performance measures include:
• Arkansan “customer satisfaction” scores (could be use of Net Promoter Score or other
satisfaction surveys).
• Identify relevant operational metrics that could be impacted by experience initiatives or
process improvement (e.g., inbound calls, which could reduce with self-service options).
• Number of Arkansan inquiries actioned.
• Identify operational efficiencies; and,
• Proliferation of operational best practices.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: No potential savings were identified in relation to this initiative, however
this is an enabling initiative which will help departments realize improvements to operations and
customer experience, which could result in future cost savings.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across state departments, state leadership, and
with citizens is critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are included for
each audience in Figure 34. Key activities and timing for communication plan are included in
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan.
Figure 34 – FUNC-60 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Departmental leads • TSS is working with the • Leadership • Sec. Leslie
Governor’s Office to drive meetings Fisken
operational excellence and • Emails
customer experience • Town hall style
improvements through a meeting
statewide initiative
• TSS will be working with state
agency COOs/functional
departmental leadership to
involve them in developing the
goals and metrics and
ensuring that proper KPIs are
identified and that data
offered will be actionable and
acted upon when available
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 115
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Governor’s Office • Operational excellence effort • Leadership • Sec. Leslie
will need direction and meetings Fisken
support from state leadership
as well as agency leadership in
order to function with the most
benefit to the state
Functional Initiative #73 - Standardize and improve large IT program
governance and management
This initiative focuses on standardizing and improving large IT program governance and management
to minimize project schedule and cost over-runs by introducing a governance oversight model that
includes independent validation of project progress and project budget tracking.
This model is split into two tiers:
I. portfolio governance which monitors status, health, and prioritization of projects at a
Statewide level
II. individual project governance for the largest approximately 18 identified projects
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Department of Transformation and Shared
Services, Division of Information Systems (DIS) is the premier information technology products and
solutions provider for the state. DIS provides IT products and solutions to state entities, K-12 public
schools, cities and counties, and public safety organizations across the state.
As discussed in greater detail in the Arkansas Forward Strategic IT Procurement Plan, TSS Overview,
and initiatives TSS-13 and TSS-30, Arkansas’ IT Procurement organization across the enterprise
remains in many ways fragmented and inefficient, despite the existence of DIS as a resource for other
departments. This lack of coordination leads to duplication, delays, and inefficiencies, which
challenge the notion that centralized IT functions can be a value-add to individual departments.
The state’s largest IT projects are distributed throughout multiple departments; departments vary in
their available resources and skills in managing these complex projects.
Rationale: Introducing a governance oversight model that includes independent validation of
project progress and project budget tracking will support standardization and improvement of large
IT programs. According to DIS staff interviews, IT projects in Arkansas would be improved by creating
two levels of review/approval and therefore implementing a governance structure that ensures the
state receives a strong Return on Investment:
• Governance committee: This committee would be tasked with reviewing project requests
using standard criteria (business case, return on investment) and once approved, would
receive structured, ongoing updates on the progression of the state’s largest projects.
Although application development and management has not been centralized at TSS, should
this change, this body could be used to make decisions about whether a project could move
forward and prioritize use of state resources.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 116
• Technical review: This committee would include technical leaders from TSS and serve as an
architecture review board to requirements and proposed solutions for state-built solutions
and provide technical input on RFPs. There would be a redress or review process in case a
department did not agree with the technical board’s findings (to the governance committee).
As in other IT initiatives, Arkansas’ DIS can increase the visibility of its value-add by establishing
service levels and tracking performance, such as speed in responding to review requests or
overseeing timely contract performance and minimized change orders. DIS can begin with IT
contracts it has helped develop and is currently monitoring, sharing out its performance to build trust
and buy-in. North Carolina’s IT Procurement Dashboard provides a best practice (see FUNC-11).
A review of other states that have consolidated statewide IT management identifies a few best
practices that TSS should consider in moving forward with this initiative. For example, in New
Hampshire, the state has moved to a completely centralized IT model, where the Department of
Information Technology (DoIT) is the help desk for all state departments and manages all
applications. One factor contributing to the success of the program was the establishment of the IT
Council, which functions like a private sector board. The Council includes agency heads from the
“client” departments served by DoIT, private sector, local leaders, legislators, representatives of
higher education, among others. The IT Council is responsible for advising on the development of
the state’s strategic IT roadmap (important to include non-technology leaders in the development of
the strategy) and advising the CIO on the following:
• Development of statewide information technology plans, policies, and standards.
• IT system consolidation and implementation of centralized IT services.
• IT resource allocation and budgeting; and,
• IT service procurement and outsourcing.
Texas’ Quality Assurance Team (QAT) offers another potential model for consideration. QAT is an
interagency work group composed of representatives from the Department of Information Resources
(DIR), State Auditor’s Office (SAO), and the Legislative Budget Board (LBB). QAT's goal is to assist
agencies successfully complete projects on time, scope and within budget. QAT monitors major
information resource projects whose development costs exceed $5 Million, or as designated by the
Legislature, due to their complexity and the resulting risks these projects pose to the state. QAT is
also required to review any contract for the development of major information resources projects
with an expected value of at least $10 million, as well as certain contract amendments. QAT must
also review and approve contract amendments if cumulative changes affect the original contract
value by 10% or more. Amendments for projects that QAT is monitoring are not valid without QAT
approval. This approval authority allows QAT to mitigate risks in contracts that support major IT
projects.
QAT members conduct regular oversight of projects throughout their lifecycle. Agencies must obtain
QAT approval before initiating a major information resources project. QAT oversight includes review
and monitoring of the project milestones shown below in Figure 35.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 117
Figure 35 – QAT IT Project Review Milestones
Reprinted from Legislative Budget Board, “Overview of Information Technology IT within State Government and the Quality
Assurance Team,” February 2024.
QAT’s involvement in large IT projects begins with reviewing framework documents for projects and
original Project Documents. Revised Business Cases for projects over 10% schedule or budget, and
Cost Benefit Analyses for projects over 50% schedule or budget. Monitoring includes requesting
detailed information about projects from agencies and reporting progress to the Legislature,
monthly/quarterly monitoring reports of project status, and expanded monitoring for entities
assigned “Additional Monitoring Warranted” by the SAO. QAT is also available to consult agencies
during project Initiation, planning, and execution, while initiating projects, and during major issue
resolution.
QAT’s reporting duties include managing a performance dashboard for large IT projects that is
populated using data from agency project monitoring reports and displays performance indicators
in the areas of budget, schedule, scope, and quality. Depending on the risk level of the project, data
are either entered quarterly or monthly. The dashboard framework is shown in Figure 36 below.
Figure 36 – QAT Dashboard
Indicator Description Green Rating Yellow Rating Red Rating
Cost Cost Performance is a measure of the Ratio of 0.90 or Ratio between Ratio less than
Performance financial effectiveness and efficiency of a greater. 0.80 and 0.90. 0.80.
project. It represents the amount of
completed work for every unit of cost spent.
As a ratio it is calculated by dividing the
budgeted cost of work performed, or earned
value, by the actual cost of the work
performed.
Schedule Schedule Performance is a measure of how Ratio of 0.90 or Ratio between Ratio less than
Performance close a project is to being completed to the greater. 0.80 and 0.90. 0.80.
schedule. As a ratio it is calculated by
dividing the budgeted cost of work
performed, or earned value, by the planned
value.
Scope Scope Performance is a measure derived Impacted the Impacted the Impacted the
Performance from reviewing the budget impact of project project budget project budget project budget
scope changes over the preceding 12 by 10 % or less. by greater than by greater than
months. Scope changes in the preceding 12 10% and less 20%.
months that impact the project budget by an than or equal to
increase of specified amounts indicate the 20%.
rating.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 118
Quality Quality Performance is a measure derived Project is Project is Project is not
Performance from a series of quality measures specific to achieving its missing some achieving its
each project and each project phase. Quality stated quality quality quality
is measured throughout the project lifecycle objectives. objectives and objectives and
during project deliverable reviews, during requires agency requires agency
testing, and after the system has been management management
implemented. The quality of vendor notification. intervention.
performance will also be measured.
Source: QAT, DIR.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Ensure there is top-down, cabinet level support behind new governance and establish clear
and understood recourse options if new policies and procedures are not followed to mitigate
the risk that departments may push back or try to avoid participating in new IT program
governance.
• Develop new program governance in concert with department IT leaders to effectively
assuage and address any concerns about efficiency loss to minimize the risk that IT program
governance could make individual departments less efficient.
• Build a customer-focused culture at DIS, viewing Secretaries and CIOs as customers or
clients. Establishment of service level expectations, publishing data on performance,
dedicating time to engagement and collaboration with the cabinet departments are all
strategies to reinforce this customer focus. DIS leadership should continue to model this
behavior for staff and reinforce and recognize staff for delivering excellent service to partner
departments. This approach and culture change will support DIS’ enhanced role as a result
of this and other strategic initiatives and will build support from other departments over time.
Recommended steps for standardizing and improving large IT program governance and
management (future state):
• Create a small task force of CIOs across representative departments to advise DIS on this
initiative, with a dedicated project management resource.
• Refine enterprise-wide project data to collect full portfolio of projects across departments.
• Analyze projects to determine cost threshold for automatic inclusion and additional risk or
other factors that warrant inclusion in governance.
• Develop high-level governance design (governance bodies, metrics, dashboard for
reporting). This should consider two tiers of governance: a strategic body to review, approve,
and prioritize projects, and receive ongoing updates, and a technical oversight component.
o Consider inclusion of Department Secretaries on the governance body.
o For the technical design review, this should be a panel of IT experts able to assess
project requirements and the technical solution for soundness.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 119
• Establish suite of best practice project tools and templates (such as for a project charter,
business requirements document, business case, return on investment calculation) for large
IT projects.
• Collect input from CIOs on high level plan.
• Write and syndicate governance policies across departments.
• Establish best practices, tools, and training to support IT project management.
• Provide training on governance and project management practices for Secretaries, COIs and
other senior IT leadership at departments, and IT project managers embedded within
departments.
• Pilot new governance processes with 3-4 representative projects across different
departments.
• Launch new governance process with full departmental participation.
• Launch recurring IT project management training program.
• Monitor ongoing impact of governance process and adapt as needed.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: The vision of
DIS is “to lead and optimize technology resources for Arkansas public sector.” Implementing this
initiative is aligned with current department priorities, staffing, and resources, however additional
CIO and FTE staff time will be required. This initiative will result in benefits due to more consistent
management of large IT projects, regardless of whether the State of Arkansas continues with the
centralization of IT functions at DIS.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial DIS staff analysis
indicates that a centralized team of IT leadership and experts to establish governance policies,
manage systems, and enforce standards will be necessary to implement this initiative. A $4 million
estimated cost from CIO and FTE time dedication. Existing project management tools can be utilized.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: DIS and CIO leadership will need to develop policies and procedures related to governance
and management for large IT projects, including for determining risk and related risk mitigation
through monitoring. Statutory and/or rulemaking changes may be necessary to successfully
implement this initiative.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to improve large IT project development and performance through
improved and standardized project management. Recommended performance measures include:
• Annual IT spend as a percent of total revenues.
• Average project cost, including any overages from initial contract cost.
• Number of change orders per project.
• Number of IT projects completed on time; and,
• Quality of deliverables.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 120
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: Preliminary TSS estimates indicate this initiative will result in a recurring
fiscal impact of $23 million due to improved requirements gathering, reduced use of change orders,
improved project management, fewer project delays and extensions, and improved project
outcomes.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across state CIOs and DIS is critical to this
initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are included for each audience in Figure 37. Key
activities and timing for communication plan are included in Appendix A – Work Plan.
Figure 37 – FUNC-73 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
State agency CIOs • The complexity and cost of IT • Meeting of state • Jay Harton
projects necessitates a CIOs
coordinated and
comprehensive oversight
process
• DIS will lead effort to
coordinate CIOs and develop
governance and management
framework for large IT projects
• CIOs will be integral in
developing and managing
framework; this is not a DIS
project but an Arkansas
enterprise project to ensure
best value and quality IT
solutions for Arkansas
State Leadership • DIS and CIOs need state • One-on-one • Jay Harton
(agency heads, leadership to support new leadership
Governor’s Office, large IT project framework; meetings
Legislature) may require legislative
changes, will require staff time
• Framework is a best practice
and will help ensure Arkansas
tax dollars are being prudently
used for projects by leverage IT
expertise and a dedicated
project management oversight
function; will ensure state ROI
State IT staff • A new large IT framework being • Emails to IT staff • Jay Harton
implemented to aid in • Agency meetings
improving development and • Website postings
oversight of IT projects. This is
a resource and service to
make large, complex projects
easier, ensure value, and hold
vendors accountable, not
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 121
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
simply police and monitor
their process
Functional Initiative #82 - Reduce reliance on outside contractors
This initiative focuses on adjusting pay and benefits to move relevant positions from third party
contractors to in-house in order to build talent and lower net costs.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Office of Personnel Management (OPM)
administers the state’s personnel system and establishes necessary policies and procedures to
ensure system uniformity under state and federal laws. OPM provides for the efficient utilization of
state resources and the effective management of Classification and Compensation, Payroll, and
Training. OPM is currently in the process of revising the state’s job classifications as part of the Pay
Plan; some departmental staffing needs are addressed through this proposal (e.g., for nursing). From
a sequencing perspective, OPM would like to monitor the impact of these changes prior to
implementing additional changes to the Pay Plan.
Analysis conducted by OPM staff as well as department CFOs indicates that there is reliance on
contractors within certain departments for critical and specialized staffing areas where it is difficult
for the State to recruit qualified candidates and compete with the private sector. Some examples of
these needs include for IT application development, nursing (Department of Health Services for
state-operated facilities and Arkansas Department of Veterans Administration for Veterans Homes
are two examples), and specialty areas (nutrition-at Schools for the Blind/Deaf at Arkansas
Department of Education, and for certain specialty fields like engineers and architects across
multiple departments). In these cases, the departments have a critical business need but cannot
match the pay or (in case of nursing), pay is close to private sector but cannot match schedules,
flexibility, and other features of working in the private sector.
Rationale: By adjusting position classification for relevant positions (increasing pay and benefits),
the State seeks to shift from use of contractors to state employees. This strategy will allow Arkansas
departments to build talent and lower net costs. OPM can be a valuable resource to departments in
undertaking this effort due to its centralized position and expertise in personnel matters. For
example, OPM annually reviews Labor Market data (Salary.com) and has an annual exercise where
they work with departments to gather and analyze salary and other personnel information. OPM can
therefore leverage its existing relationships and processes to help implement this initiative and
improve the State’s workforce.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – TSS Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with TSS staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 122
• Determine clear and consistent criteria for adjusting pay tables to allow departments to
move from use of contractors to employees (demonstrating either cost neutrality or savings
to the State), garner support from department Secretaries, and have exceptions process
where necessary to mitigate the risk that departments may not want to move contracted
positions in-house.
• Ensure quality of market-researched compensation benchmarks, match market pay and
benefits on highest priority roles, and market the advantages of employment by state
departments to address the risk that there may not be enough skilled applicants to fill roles
moved from contracts to state employees.
Recommended steps for reducing dependence on contractors (future state):
• Conduct analysis of current contractor positions across departments and identify potential
roles suitable for transition to state employee role.
• Prioritize certain departments/disciplines (e.g. IT, nursing) to focus on initially for bringing
staff in-house. This may be a manual exercise going through each department’s needs.
• Benchmark current pay for employee position grades to contracted positions against market
standards and determine potential changes to pay grade classification to increase market
competitiveness.
• Develop proposal to upgrade existing positions to where salaries are comparable or develop
new pay schedule for position classification; pilot these changes with first phase of rollout.
• Select positions to transition in-house and outline a phased approach for rollout.
• Receive necessary approvals for transition of roles, including working with the Legislature as
necessary.
• Design reporting structures for transitioned roles and notify managers of upcoming
organizational changes.
• Determine additional training capabilities needed for transitioned positions and acquire
training materials for onboarding new employees.
• Following initial rollout pilot, assess retention, contracting levels; if pay plan changes do not
address issues, consult with the impacted department on ways to address (e.g., can
alternate work schedules be used, signing bonuses, or other strategies).
• Develop and deploy a recruitment strategy for new positions to attract qualified candidates.
• Provide training and support to new employees.
• Monitor ongoing impact of transitioned roles and adapt as necessary.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: OPM is charged
with ensuring the efficient utilization of state resources and the effective management of
Classification and Compensation, Payroll, and Training. Implementing this initiative is aligned with
current department priorities, staffing, and resources.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Initial TSS staff analysis
indicates that IT systems to track performance metrics (e.g., PowerBI or Tableau) and experts in
contracted labor may be necessary, but no substantial one-time cost is estimated, given that TSS
has access to such platforms now through enterprise contracts.
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 123
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: OPM will need to establish process changes related to the state’s pay plan, including
legislative changes.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to improve statewide staffing practices to reduce over-reliance on
contractors. Recommended performance measures include:
• Reduction in contracted labor costs.
• Number of contracted positions moved in-house (to state employee positions).
• Employee retention rates in affected job classifications; and,
• Average project cost over time.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: The fiscal impact of this initiative cannot be determined until the specific
departments and positions of focus are identified. However, it is anticipated this initiative will result
in cost savings from the shift of high-cost contractors to more cost-effective state employees, even
when accounting for the upgraded classifications. For example, at Department of Human Services
(DHS), in the Medicaid Finance area, DHS is paying hourly rates of $250 for specialized cost
allocation assistance, which could be reduced in favor of in-house staff.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across OSP, state procurement leadership, and
the state leaderships is critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are
included for each audience in Figure 38. Key activities and timing for communication plan are
included in Appendix A – TSS Work Plan.
Figure 38 – FUNC-82 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
State department leads • OPM undertaking an effort to • Meeting of state • Kay
improve state employment department Barnhill
and retention and save funds leaders
• OPM will serve as a resource
to help departments identify
critical talent shortages and
develop strategies to bring
these positions in-house to
build necessary talent pool
and reduce costs for the
agency and the state
• Please help to identify the
priority staffing needs for your
department to inform this
effort
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 124
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
State leadership • Reducing the reliance on • Leadership • Kay Barnhill
(Governor’s Office, contractors not only meetings
Legislature) strengthens Arkansas’ talent • Meetings with
pipeline, improving services Legislature
for Arkansans, but it may • One-on-one
result in reduce or neutral meetings
costs by not paying
contractors for long periods
• In order to reduce reliance on
contractors, certain changes
to pay plan and related
policies will likely need to be
made
TSS Strategic Management Plan Final 10/09/2024 125
Strategic Management Plan:
Arkansas Department of Commerce
Table of Contents
Overview .................................................................................................................2
Recommended Organizational Structure ..................................................................2
Meeting the Vision of an Effective and Efficient Future Department: ..................................................... 5
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation ................................6
Organization-Related Improvements ........................................................................9
Initiative ACOM #0 - Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and efficiency .......9
Initiative ACOM #7 - Develop an internal IT shared services team to provide improved support
and unified standards .............................................................................................................23
Initiative ACOM #8 - Consolidate financial operations to a central hub that uses automated
systems for budget tracking and expense management ...........................................................27
Initiative ACOM #23 - Optimize AEDC functional ownership by determining which existing teams
should be part of Workforce Connection and ADFA .................................................................34
Initiative ACOM #24 - Consolidate HR to a central hub that uses automated systems to reduce
over-processing and inefficiency.............................................................................................37
Initiative ACOM #25 - Effectively integrate the Banking and Securities teams to most effectively
leverage the strengths of both orgs..........................................................................................46
Operational Efficiencies ......................................................................................... 50
Initiative ACOM #5 - Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business critical/duplicative
applications across all divisions of Commerce ........................................................................50
Customer Experience Initiatives ............................................................................. 54
Initiative ACOM #21 - Create standard processes to improve customer satisfaction within
defined business days in Commerce’s call centers in Re-employment .....................................54
Initiative ACOM #27 - Develop a performance framework that defines the customer base and
establishes and tracks success metrics ..................................................................................60
Statewide Grant Oversight and Administration Initiatives ........................................ 68
Initiative ACOM #38 - Assess potential for centralizing grants to improve compliance and
increase efficiency .................................................................................................................68
Initiative ACOM #46 - Create a grant writing center of excellence .............................................72
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
1
Overview
Formed in 2019 by Act 910, the Arkansas Department of Commerce (ACOM) exists to create an
economic environment where every Arkansan can achieve prosperity and quality of life. ACOM is the
umbrella department that includes key economic development drivers, consisting of the following
divisions:
• Arkansas Development Finance Authority
• Arkansas Division of Aeronautics
• Arkansas Division of Workforce Services
• Arkansas Economic Development Commission
• Arkansas Insurance Department
• Arkansas Securities Department
• Arkansas State Bank Department
• Arkansas Waterways Commission
• Arkansas Wine Producers Council
• Office of Skills Development
Through the Arkansas Forward project, a 2024 initiative to improve the efficiency and effectiveness
of Arkansas’ 15 cabinet-level departments, ACOM will realign its organizational structure to
strengthen its ability to perform core roles and responsibilities and prioritized implementation of 11
priority initiatives including multiple initiatives focused on the organization’s design, and as well as
two related to statewide centralization of the process for administration and monitoring of grants.
This Strategic Management Plan (“Plan”) memorializes the work completed by ACOM during
Arkansas Forward, translating the department’s vision into a plan consisting of recommended
organizational structure, key initiatives prioritized for immediate implementation, and related
performance metrics. A companion project plan (“Work Plan”) provides a more detailed resource to
support implementation of the initiatives by ACOM’s Arkansas Forward project management team.
Recommended Organizational Structure
ACOM’s current functional organization chart is shown in Figure 1, which reflects a number of
changes announced in January 2024 including a shift to shared services under the Chief of Staff,
establishment of Finance and Procurement and Marketing and Communications as two
departments reporting to the Secretary, reorganization of the Division of Workforce Services
(resulting in creation of a freestanding Re-employment Division and restructuring of Workforce
Connection, among other changes), and a consolidation of the Banking and Securities divisions.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
2
Figure 1 – High Level Functional Organizational Structure (January 2024)
As part of Arkansas Forward, ACOM’s structure was reviewed further to identify opportunities for
redesign in three areas:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission;
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives; and,
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions.
ACOM has been at the forefront of transformation, beginning review of its organizational structure
prior to Arkansas Forward. ACOM has taken the goal of creating a more agile organization to heart
and completed a review of each division’s organization to identify opportunities to create a more
agile organization. Some improvements have already been developed (e.g., reorganizing the Division
of Workforce Services into the Workforce Connection division and investing in key leaders under the
Deputy Commissioner, consolidating the State Bank Department and the Securities Department)
and additional opportunities have been identified as part of Arkansas Forward including moving to a
shared services model for information technology, human resources, marketing and
communications, finance/procurement, and implementing improvements in six of the largest
divisions/program areas.
Recommendations for ACOM’s future state organization, based on department interviews and
analysis include:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission: ACOM has
initiated a shared services implementation within its department for finance and
procurement (ACOM-24), human resources (ACOM-8), marketing and communications, and
information technology (ACOM-7).
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives: Other
Arkansas Forward initiatives related to ACOM’s organization include completing the
integration of the State Bank and Securities Department (ACOM-25), and optimizing manager
roles and making other organization design improvements in six divisions (which are outlined
further in ACOM-0) including:
o Arkansas Economic Development Commission (ACOM-23);
o Workforce Connection;
o Re-employment Division;
o Adult Rehabilitation Services;
o Insurance; and
o Finance and Procurement.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
3
As summarized in Figure 2, each of these divisions underwent a review of their organization
structure with consultant support, and identified opportunities for improvement.
Figure 2 – Summary of ACOM Organization Improvements by Division
Source: Consultant team.
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions:
Based on direction from the Steering Committee, Transformation and Shared Services (TSS)
will assume responsibility for the Payroll and Help Desk functions statewide, as the first
Human Resources and Information Technology functions to transfer to TSS in a statewide
shared services model. Additional decisions on sequencing of further functions have not yet
been determined. Aside from these functions, ACOM will move forward with its own internal
shared services centralization for the IT and Human Resources teams and review any
investments in these teams (such as a ticketing system, which was identified by the IT as
necessary) carefully to avoid duplication with TSS.
These recommendations do not suggest further changes to the Secretary’s direct reports or
the current high-level functional chart organization, however detailed division before and
after organization charts are presented in the next section).
Figure 3 – High-Level Recommended Organizational Structure
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
4
Meeting the Vision of an Effective and Efficient Future Department:
ACOM leadership has begun implementing many of these organization changes over the last year
and has prioritized the investment in the right structure and team to enable the department to fulfill
its mission and implement other Arkansas Forward improvements. In areas where further change is
needed, leaders have been empowered to revise their organization charts. While many of the staff
are making internal resource reallocations within their current budget and position authority, ACOM
will require support from TSS Office of Personnel Management and may need budgetary authority
and other approvals from the Legislature to make all intended changes.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
5
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation
ACOM leadership generated nearly 40 ideas to improve the departmental effectiveness and
efficiency, before prioritizing 11 initiatives for immediate implementation as part of Arkansas
Forward. These initiatives are organized into the following categories: 1) organization-related
improvements, 2) operational efficiencies, 3) customer experience initiatives, and 4) improving
statewide grant oversight and administration.
The complete list of the high priority Arkansas Forward initiatives for the department includes:
• ACOM-0 – Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and efficiency
• ACOM-5 – Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business critical/duplicative
applications across all divisions of Commerce
• ACOM-7 – Develop an internal IT shared services team to provide improved support and
unified standards
• ACOM-8 – Consolidate financial operations to a central hub that uses automated systems
for budget tracking and expense management
• ACOM-21 – Create standard processes to improve customer satisfaction within defined
business days in Commerce’s call centers in Re-employment
• ACOM-23 – Optimize AEDC functional ownership by determining which existing teams
should be part of Workforce Connection and ADFA
• ACOM-24 – Consolidate HR to a central hub that uses automated systems to reduce over-
processing and inefficiency
• ACOM-25 – Effectively integrate the Banking and Securities teams to most effectively
leverage the strengths of both organizations
• ACOM-27 – Develop a performance framework that defines the customer base and
establishes and tracks success metrics
• ACOM-38 – Assess potential for centralizing grant administration within ACOM to improve
oversight, compliance, and increase efficiency
• ACOM-46 – Create a grant writing center of excellence at ACOM to help the State track
federal opportunities, maximize its federal funding, and improve the quality of the State’s
competitive grant applications
As evident based on the fact that 6 out of 11 initiatives are organization-related, ACOM’s focus as
part of Arkansas Forward is to optimize and invest in its team to enable the organization to deliver on
its mission.
Summary of Fieldwork Performed
ACOM prioritized several shared services consolidations, in particular, as the most important
Arkansas Forward initiatives. To support ACOM in implementing these initiatives, consultant support
was provided to work directly with the initiative owners and staff responsible for making these
changes through in-person facilitated sessions in June and July 2024, to empower them with a set of
tools to complete this work, based on the Lean Six Sigma methodology. Six Sigma is a set of
techniques and tools for process improvement created in the mid-1980s by Bill Smith, an engineer
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
6
at Motorola. Today, Six Sigma is one of several best-in-class methodologies used for process
improvement.
The tools utilized in the work with ACOM’s team include:
• Process mapping: to review existing or create new maps of step-by-step sequence of key
tasks for a process as a method to understand who is responsible for each step, identify
where there is divergence in practice, and highlight specific changes that are needed in the
“future state.”
• Strategic Compass: to obtain a shared vision of “what good looks like” for a desired process
and find the primary bottlenecks in the process(es).
• Interference Diagram: to identify obstacles (show-stoppers and simple hurdles) to achieving
the goal that are identified.
• Strategic Path: Using sufficiency-based logic, the staff ensure that all needed steps are
present to achieve the objectives. They construct the plan in a thorough, deliberative
manner. Once complete, the department has a turnkey plan that can be executed.
These tools build on each other in a step-wise manner, leading a team from a high level goal to a
specific plan of actionable steps to achieve it. Using a Six Sigma Black Belt, the consultant team
focused on building this capacity within the ACOM team to provide a foundation for successful
implementation of the Arkansas Forward initiatives.
A summary of major activities and timeline includes:
• Initiative owner interviews: completed in June-July 2024; The purpose was to review planned
field work and revise based on needs.
• Interviews with prioritized division leaders regarding organization charts: completed in June-
July 2024; The purpose of these sessions was to serve as a thought partner to the leader,
review and provide feedback on proposals drafted, discuss organizational
priorities/concerns, and share other state examples if applicable/requested.
• Group facilitated sessions: The purpose of these sessions was to use a facilitator to create
the tools needed to develop a detailed action plan for the implementation of initiatives
prioritized by the department.
o June 2024 – Human Resources Team (ACOM-24 current state)
o July 2024 – Human Resources Team (ACOM-24 future state; ACOM-8
Finance/Procurement Team; ACOM-27 Performance Framework)
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
7
Expected Financial Impact of Initiatives
# Initiative Cost Impacts Savings Estimated
0 Optimize manager roles and team size for better <-$50,000 $800,000
control and efficiency
5 Coordinate identification and retirement of non- N/A $5.4M
business critical/duplicative IT applications
across all divisions of Commerce
7 Develop an internal IT shared services team to N/A $270,000
provide improved support and unified standards
8 Consolidate financial operations to a central hub -$100,000 $100,000
that uses automated systems for budget tracking
and expense management
21 Create standardized procedures to improve N/A N/A
customer satisfaction within defined business
days in Commerce’s call centers in Re-
employment
23 Optimize AEDC functional ownership by N/A N/A
determining which existing teams should be part
of Workforce Connection and ADFA
24 Consolidate HR to a central hub that uses -$100,000 $120,000
automated systems to reduce over-processing
and inefficiency
25 Effectively integrate the Banking and Securities <-$50,000 N/A
teams to most effectively leverage the strengths of
both orgs
27 Develop a performance framework that defines N/A N/A
the customer base and establishes and tracks
success metrics
38 Assess potential for centralizing grants improve Investment in new team,
compliance and increase efficiency number of impacted staff
for transfer to be
determined upon
completion of
assessment.
46 Create a grant writing center of excellence Investment in new team, Additional federal
number of impacted staff financial participation
for transfer to be estimated to be $5M
determined upon
completion of
assessment.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
8
Organization-Related Improvements
Initiative ACOM #0 - Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and
efficiency
This initiative is a primary component of a core Arkansas Forward priority: for each cabinet-level
department to build an agile organization. It includes implementation of a tailored and modernized
organization to ensure effective distribution of management responsibilities, enhanced operational
efficiency, and improved role clarity among managerial positions.
Initiative Overview and Current State: ACOM’s divisions are unique and distinct in their
responsibilities, with many of them previously existing as freestanding departments their merger into
ACOM. The organization has undergone a substantial review of its structure and size over the past
year to identify opportunities for improvement.
Rationale: As part of Initiative ACOM-0, to create the most agile and efficient organization, ACOM
identified opportunities across its organization. For each division, a meeting was conducted with the
division leader to review organizational priorities, test any new proposed structure based on a
standardized list of elements (span of control, layers, use of vacancies, use of performance data to
right-size department), provide feedback on proposals drafted, otherwise serve as a thought partner
to the leader, and share other state examples if applicable/requested. There was focus on six priority
areas identified by Secretary McDonald:
• Finance and Procurement – Create a centralized Finance and Procurement team by moving
division chief financial officers to report to ACOM chief financial officer. The reporting
relationship will be direct for divisions funded with state funds and remain dotted line for
certain federally-funded positions where cost allocation would be an issue or regulatory
divisions restrict shared services reporting. Because division team includes staff who fulfill
a variety of finance and procurement functions, once the new team is formed, additional
work is needed to organize the staff functionally and in the new shared services model.
Figure 4 shows the current organization structure and Figure 5 shows the proposed
structure at the direct report level to the CFO. Within each leader’s organization, there is a
need to realign the resources to the shared service model. Therefore, additional
reorganization will be required to address the shared services model, as allowable under
state and federal laws, regulations, guidance.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
9
Figure 4 – Finance/Procurement Current Organization Chart
Figure 5 – Finance/Procurement Future Organization Chart
• Arkansas Economic Development Commission (ACOM-23) – Key recommendations
include to create a new Strategy Unit to research and guide strategic opportunities for the
state and reduce reliance on consultants; establish a career path and right-size the number
of Project Managers; address duplication with Workforce Connection and business
engagement team by moving part of this function to Workforce Connection; and address an
additional layer of the team that can be eliminated in favor of increased span of control for a
leader. Figure 6 shows the current structure and Figure 7 shows the proposed structure, with
key changes noted in green.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
10
Figure 6 – AEDC Current Organization Chart
Figure 7 – AEDC Proposed Organization Chart
• Workforce Connection – This broad workforce function is in process of reorganization
whereas the division previously known as the Division of Workforce Services has become a
group of three divisions: Arkansas Workforce Connection, Re-employment (formerly
Unemployment Insurance), and Workforce Policy and Innovation. The Workforce
Connection division has also released a large number of positions (over 100). Initial
additional recommendations for this area include to reorganize the Office of Business
Engagement and Training (with some staff from AEDC) and to redesign the Employment
Services team into a call center model that more efficiently utilizes resources statewide.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
11
There are some opportunities in the future to review the two largest divisions to study
managerial spans and layers (diagnostics review suggests there is greatest opportunity for
ACOM here) and to implement a workload study to right-size the workforce.
• Re-employment Division – Given its growing responsibilities over time, the division has
been elevated to a freestanding division, reporting directly to the Secretary. There is a need
to do a comprehensive reorganization within the division and to invest in new, higher position
grades to elevate the quality and skillset of the workforce by converting/repurposing existing
vacancies, and re-adjusting team size to address imbalances in managerial spans of control.
The proposal also addresses the number of organizational layers through flattening of some
team structures. This division has already implemented workload metrics in several key
areas to inform analysis of staffing needs and ensure “right-sizing” of its workforce. Figures
8 and 9 present the current and proposed organization charts with position classification
detail to illustrate the efficiencies implemented as well as repurposing of vacancies.
Figure 8 – Re-employment Current Organization Chart
Figure 9 – Re-employment Proposed Organization Chart
• Adult Rehabilitation Services – The primary focus within this team is to address the ARS
commissioner’s span of control and immediate reports’ spans of control to establish the
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
12
leadership structure. This includes an expanded scope of the Deputy Commissioner role.
There is some realignment of responsibilities proposed across teams as part of this span of
control work. There is an opportunity to use workload studies in the future to ensure the team
is “right-sized,” as have been used in other divisions. Multiple divisions will become dotted
line reports to the Deputy Commissioner. Figures 10 and 11 present the current and
proposed organization charts.
Figure 10 – ARS Current Organization Chart
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
13
Figure 11 – ARS Proposed Organization Chart
• Insurance – This division has proposed to meet a business need by creating a new Deputy
Commissioner role over Legal Market Conduct and consolidating licensing, legal, and
consumer protection resources to further collaboration (adds a managerial layer but does
so in the name of other efficiencies). Figure 12 presents the current organization chart, with
the number of direct reports noted for managers. Figure 13 presents the proposed
organization chart, with the new staff position noted in green. Conforming edits are made to
move the IT and Human Resources staff to centralized teams in the future state, and to
create a dotted line reporting structure between the Insurance CFO and the ACOM CFO.
There is an opportunity to use workload studies in the future to support further organization
re-design, to address some of the small teams through potential combination of units, and
to assess workload in like-titled roles.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
14
Figure 12 – Current Insurance Organization Chart
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
15
Figure 13 – Proposed Insurance Organization Chart
Although the Information Technology and Human Resources teams were not highlighted directly as
part of these six units, the structures for these departments were considered through ACOM-7 and
ACOM-24.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan provides the action steps in
the recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative.
Considerations for the transition to more shared services within the department raises the need for
departmental planning in several key areas. When changes involve people – who they report to and
changes in their responsibilities – that can introduce the need for a greater investment in planning,
communication, and change management.
The experience of other states in moving to statewide shared services is instructive for ACOM, even
though its centralization is at the department level. For example, the Florida “Service First Initiative,”
which was implemented in the early 2000 as part of a shared services initiative to consolidate and
outsource human resources operations among the executive branch agencies to a single HR vendor, faced
several challenges ranging from employee morale, service quality, contract management, technology
integration, and stakeholder criticisms. Some of the lessons learned included:
• A need to perform more change management and readiness planning, instead of a focus on
traditional project management.
• Because of the pace of the implementation and the lack of knowledge in managing large scale
implementations of this nature, the data migration and system integration were more complex
and problematic than expected and that is something that could have been better planned. This
may impact moving to a central hub for all three of the shared services contemplated by ACOM.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
16
• There was a need for more robust communications with leaders. Some examples of effective tools
that were used in later implementations were scripts for leaders, communication packets,
timelines for leaders on when messaging was going to be distributed, info sessions, and town
halls.
• It is important to consider the “change readiness” of the organizational culture and its history
with implementing large-scale changes. Conservatively, the one should assume low change
readiness and plan for it accordingly. Although some divisions plan for more modest changes, the
amount of total transformation occurring at ACOM should be planned for.
Further discussion around best practices in shared services was established in a 2015 report
“Making Shared Services Work for You.” While the report includes information on governance,
project management, and other areas, of particular interest for ACOM is change management.
Change management, the report includes, is a strategy preparing the organization for significant
change in the way it operates, and includes a communication plan, a readiness assessment,
workforce planning, and building trust. Change management, if done well, can build trust, increase
demand for services, promote transparency, and advertise project successes as traction is gained.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Given the investment ACOM is making to its organization, ACOM may consider
implementation of a staff engagement survey to assess the impact of the changes and
whether monitor the changes (either overall or within affected departments) are having the
intended impact. Many public and private employers use employee satisfaction and
engagement surveys to collect employee feedback on a variety of topics. There exists a large
body of research on relevant domains of questions and question design types by industry. In
addition to these tools, some states have developed their own tools or partnered with
educational institutions to build customized surveys for their state employees.
Examples include:
o Texas Survey of Employee Engagement (SEE) survey: The survey is distributed every
two years by the University of Texas Institute for Organizational Excellence to
approximately 250,000 state employees (including higher education institutions and
school districts) and includes areas such as communication, supervision, quality,
teamwork, pay and benefits, training, diversity, ethics, management, engagement,
and technology. Use of the survey consistently over time has allowed departments
to establish a baseline and measure incremental changes, identifying where to
focus. 1 A sample survey with the questions asked is included on the University of
Texas Institute for Organizational excellence website. 2
o Oklahoma State Employee Engagement Survey: The survey was implemented
annually beginning in 2020 and is administered by the Oklahoma MES Human Capital
Management Team and includes domains such as work culture, satisfaction,
culture, and engagement. The survey is administered in the Spring through a web-
1
Texas Institute for Organizational Excellence, “Survey of Employee Engagement,”
https://sites.utexas.edu/ioe/survey.
2
Texas Institute for Organizational Excellence, “Sample Agency Executive Summary,”
https://sites.utexas.edu/ioe/files/2016/02/Sample_SEE_Summary.pdf.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
17
based application and is available for anyone with a state-issued email address to
complete. An annual summary of findings is released publicly. A statewide summary
of results provides additional detail on the domains of questions asked, including
some newer items such as a Hope Inventory (19 items) and Oldenburg Burnout Scale
(16 survey items). 3
o Washington State Employee Engagement Survey (EES): The Office of Financial
Management, State Human Resources division administers a survey to state
employees, and individual departments have the option to administer their own
survey. The survey occurs annually in October, dating back to 2006. The 2023 survey
included 37 questions engagement, diversity, communication, resources,
growth/development, inclusion/belonging, manager effectiveness, change
management, among others. The questions asked can be found online 4 and an
annual summary of results is publicly available. 5
o Minnesota developed a guide for state agencies on how to use employee survey data
proactively through creation of action plans. 6 Minnesota Management and Budget
has used an annual state employee engagement survey since 2018. The MMB
Enterprise Talent Development team has responsibility not only for developing the
survey, releasing annual results, but also supporting state departments in using the
information to support process improvement.
o For example, Texas Survey of Employee Engagement (SEE) survey is distributed every
two years by the University of Texas Institute for Organizational Excellence to
approximately 250,000 state employees (including higher education institutions and
school districts) and includes areas such as communication, supervision, quality,
teamwork, pay and benefits, training, diversity, ethics, management, engagement,
and technology. Use of the survey consistently over time has allowed departments
to establish a baseline and measure incremental changes, identifying where to
focus. 7
• ACOM needs a clear communication plan for each division’s organization changes and point
of contact regarding any staff moves. There is a need to ensure leaders understand the “why”
behind moves and can support change in their conversations with staff (may need one-
pagers or frequently asked questions). This might be particularly important where staff are
moving to central teams or will have new relationships with a central team through a dotted
3
Oklahoma, “2022 Oklahoma State Employee Engagement Survey Statewide Summary Report,”
https://oklahoma.gov/content/dam/ok/en/omes/documents/2022OKSEES.pdf.
4
Washington State, Office of Financial Management, “Employee Engagement Survey,”
https://ofm.wa.gov/sites/default/files/public/shr/Strategic%20HR/State%20Employee%20Survey/2023%20
Engagement%20Questions.pdf.
5
Washington State, Office of Financial Management, “2023 Employee Engagement Survey Executive
Summary,” https://ofm.wa.gov/state-human-resources/workforce-data-and-planning/state-employee-
engagement-survey/2023-employee-engagement-survey-executive-summary.
6
Minnesota MMB, "State Agency Employee Engagement Survey, Action Planning Toolkit,"
https://mn.gov/mmb-stat/enterprise-talent-development/2019-engagement/state-agency-employee-
engagement-survey-action-planning-toolkit.pdf.
7
Texas Institute for Organizational Excellence, “Survey of Employee Engagement,”
https://sites.utexas.edu/ioe/survey.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
18
line structure and within any division (such as ARS) where some of the former direct reports
to the Commissioner may now report to a former peer (resistance is expected). While the
leaders of the six divisions noted above are largely managing their own communication,
central communication support would be helpful for change management.
Recommended steps to implement changes to ACOM’s organization structure include:
• Identify changes required by division (in process).
• Review legal implications of proposed changes (in process).
• Obtain leadership approval for changes (in process).
• Consolidate all new organization charts and budget requests to use in ensuring ACOM
receives Legislative approval for positions (where it is needed) and related authority and
funding.
• Develop a Communication Plan – ACOM should establish a clear communication plan and
point of contact regarding any staff moves. Time should be spent by division leaders and
Communication resources to ensure leaders understand “why” behind moves and can
support change. ACOM leadership can model the “change story” work they performed during
the Arkansas Forward visioning session to create an updated “change story” related to the
additional changes being made. Additional tools such as scripts, frequently asked
questions, and fact sheets should be developed to support leaders in having discussions
with their teams about the anticipated changes. This might be particularly important where
staff are moving to central teams and within ARS, where some of the former direct reports to
the Commissioner may move down layers (resistance is expected). While the leaders of the
six divisions noted above are largely managing their own communication, central
communication support would be helpful for change management.
o Coordinate the announcements to support staff. It is a best practice for staff to receive
news of a transfer or major team change from their direct supervisor. If staff are moving
teams, they should also receive contact from their new supervisor. After all individuals
impacted directly by major team changes or moves are notified, a team meeting should
occur. As these conversations move to deeper layers of the organization, it becomes
important for leaders to be ambassadors of the message. The leadership team should
understand what is happening and why so they can facilitate these discussions.
• For the shared services consolidations:
o Determine, by division, the number of positions to move to the central team and confirm
whether the authority for the position and/or a current staff person will move to the new
central team. This analysis should occur at the position level. For example, some
Procurement and Fleet staff perform these functions for part of their roles and their
current divisions may request to retain them, while the authority for their Procurement
and Fleet functions moves to the central team.
o In the short-term, for Finance and Procurement, IT, and HR, there are some staff who can
directly report into the new central teams, and for others, the direct reporting relationship
will continue to their division director (i.e., staff within the Banking/Securities, Insurance,
and AFDA divisions), with a dotted line reporting structure into the central team. This is
due to regulatory requirements and federal funding/cost allocation issues, which may
require dedication of the positions.
o Long-term, ACOM may pursue statutory changes and update its cost allocation
methodology (obtaining necessary federal approvals as required) to support a greater
degree of integration.
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• In the case of the IT function, more detailed analysis is needed to understand which staff
will move to the central team and which staff will move to TSS as part of the shared
services consolidation of the Help Desk.
• In the case of the Human Resources function, more detailed analysis is needed to
understand which staff will move to the central team and which staff will move to TSS as
part of the shared services consolidation of Payroll.
• Conduct significant face-time with the division leaders who previously had staff embed
with their organization. Establish that they are the customer of this division, and ensure
they understand the new chain of command and key points of contact.
• Research suggests each time a new team member joins a team, the team needs to
reform. Impacted teams need team building resources (e.g., external training and team-
building resources) to support the process of becoming a high performing team.
Finance/Procurement and Human Resources might be the highest priority for this initial
investment because they are completely new teams.
• There is an opportunity to review the functions that are centralizing for improvement and
standardization. Initial process mapping has been done to create the work flows used by
Human Resources; this approach can be used for Finance and Procurement as well to
identify what the ideal process should be and ensure all the staff are adhering to it. There
is an opportunity for staff to share the best practices used in their division, which might
become the new “standard” and replicated across the entire team.
o Where staff do move to central teams (Finance/Procurement, IT, and Human Resources)
there is an opportunity for the new managers to review skills and provide training to
elevate the quality of the work.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: The proposed organization chart
for ACOM is provided above in Figure 3. Realignment of ACOM in these areas will help the
department further achieve its mission and implement Arkansas Forward.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: Process
changes are expected with some of the organization redesign, with examples including:
• Formation of a shared central HR team will result in the need to review standard team
protocols and potentially revise them (to take into account best practices used across
divisions), as well as train staff to these policies. For example, Human Resources includes
multiple sub-processes (time keeping, onboarding) and will need to formalize adoption of
and training to the new policy. This is something that was modelled for the team during the
field work using the Lean Six Sigma methodology (see overview in introduction and more
detail on process steps in ACOM-24). The team can review existing or create new maps of
step-by-step sequence of key tasks for a process as a method to understand who is
responsible for each step, identify where there is divergence in practice, and highlight
specific changes that are needed in the “future state.” The department may consider an
outside facilitator to help the team build best practices and find efficiencies in the new
shared processes as opposed to replicating the existing process. The similar impacts to IT
and Finance/Procurement are outlined in ACOM-7 and ACOM-8, respectively.
• The movement of staff from AEDC to Workforce Connections will also result in rescoping of
the responsibilities of each team and could result in some process changes, because certain
functions are no longer part of AEDC responsibilities.
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Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: This initiative is not expected to
result in additional costs greater than $50,000 (for team building and training investments). Most of
the proposed organization changes would be achieved through use of existing vacancies and other
internal changes; in instances where this is not the case, OPM and Legislative approval is needed.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The intent of this
initiative is to improve the organization’s structure to support agility, decision making, and improved
flow of communication. There are diagnostic metrics that can be used to monitor the impact of this
initiative across the organization on an ongoing basis including:
• Span of control (size);
• Number of organization layers; and,
In addition to these measures, surveys could be utilized for impacted staff during the transition to
identify and address any issues or concerns.
• Improvement in employee satisfaction scores of management support/clarity of roles (could
be enabled by survey).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: This change is expected to yield a cost savings of $800,000, however this is inclusive
of $200,000 in savings realized from consolidation of the Securities and Banking Teams (ACOM-25).
Change Management Plan: Clear communication with staff about the purpose for the changes
should accompany any information on the new process changes. Recommended messaging and
modalities are included for each audience in Figure 14. Key activities and timing for communication
plan are included in Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan.
Figure 14 – ACOM-0 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• ACOM is making some changes • Town hall. • Secretary McDonald
Staff impacted by in our organization structure as • Face-to-Face • Impacted division
changes part of Arkansas Forward. team leads
• ACOM is investing in our team meetings with • Communication
as a strategy to help us better leadership, Director
serve our customers and fulfill future
our mission. manager, and
• Detailed description of former
changes, including specific manager.
changes for every team
impacted by the reorganization.
Everyone continues to have a
place on the team.
• These changes are to • Town hall. • Communication
Other ACOM staff strengthen our team, support Director
• All staff
collaboration, and enable more email.
efficient decision-making.
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• High level summary of
changes.
• Address efficiency measures.
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Initiative ACOM #7 - Develop an internal IT shared services team to provide improved
support and unified standards
This initiative continues ACOM’s move to shared services by developing an internal Commerce IT
team to create IT standards for the Department, develop a comprehensive application inventory
across divisions, evaluate opportunities for cost savings and shared use, establish cross-functional
collaboration to provide improved support services, and ensure cyber security standards are
upheld.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The consolidation of multiple independent divisions into
ACOM has resulted in the location of IT staff through the department’s divisions. IT leadership have
identified opportunities to reduce costs by eliminating duplicative applications and subscriptions
(see ACOM-5), elevate the quality of work by developing staff in a more uniform manner, and
modernize the department’s IT applications including moving some applications off the mainframe
into cloud-based solutions, through this consolidation.
Rationale: Consolidation of ACOM’s IT application staff will yield the following expected benefits:
• Improved standardization in project management and adoption of common tools to support
on-time and on-budget completion of ACOM’s portfolio of large IT projects (see ACOM-5).
• Improved standardization in the maintenance and operation of the applications supporting
ACOM.
• Improved planning at departmental level for ACOM’s technology investments.
• Strengthened IT workforce through creation of a clear career path, ability to develop IT staff
more consistently, fostering collaboration among peers, and managing IT resources
holistically, by assigning ACOM IT resources to their highest-value use case.
Implementation Considerations: ACOM’s Secretary has decided to move ahead with
consolidation of its application staff onto one IT team, helmed by ACOM’s chief technology officer,
but to pause on consolidation of any Help Desk resources or investment in technology to support
the Help Desk function. Given that the Steering Committee for Arkansas Forward has approved the
transfer of the Help Desk function, if ACOM moves forward with this consolidation, and affected staff
have to make a second transfer to TSS, it may cause instability and strain among the workforce.
Some other Arkansas departments have consolidated their IT teams (help desk and applications)
into a central team, including the Department of Human Services and the Department of Finance
and Administration, and their experience is instructive to ACOM. DHS, for example, invested heavily
in communicating with division leaders during the transition to ensure they understood the new
chain of command and their assigned support resources, as well as how to escalate issues. In
addition, DHS used a variety of tools such as staff training for new team members and shadowing to
elevate the quality of work delivered by its consolidated teams. ACOM should, likewise, invest in
managing the relationships with division leaders during the transition and establishing service levels
(such as help desk completion turnaround time) to ensure the needs of division leads are met.
In addition, the State of New Hampshire moved to a consolidated IT shared services department
statewide. An enabler of its success was cultivating a culture of customer service and investing in
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managing relationships with its client agencies. New Hampshire used its departmental CFOs as
relationship managers under the new structure and invested in establishing a collaborative
governance model to allow leaders of its client agencies to drive strategic prioritization of the state’s
IT resources. ACOM would benefit in following New Hampshire’s lead, in placing customer service
at the heart of its reorganization and viewing other ACOM division leaders as customers. ACOM can
build a governance process for its IT projects to prioritize use of resources at the department level
and built a technology roadmap for the department going forward. In addition, a centralized team
would allow for the creation of an architecture review board to provide systematic evaluation of the
technical requirements and design of any new IT projects developed by the department.
Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative, should ACOM move forward. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with ACOM staff include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Given the decision to transfer responsibility for the Help Desk function to the Transformation
and Shared Services, Division of Information Services (DIS), ACOM should focus on the
consolidation of its application support team and not its Help Desk Resources. Likewise,
ACOM should pause on any investment in technology to support to Help Desk function (i.e.,
ticketing software) to avoid duplication.
• Develop a clear communication plan and strategies to avoid significant turnover among
directly impacted IT staff. Invest in team-building and training resources to support the CIO’s
new team leads once staff transfer to the central team, to help the teams form and
strengthen sense of belonging by new staff. This will be particularly important if staff remain
physically located in their former buildings in the short-term.
• Establish clear communication and escalation protocols to ensure departmental customers
(division leaders) understand how to engage with this team and escalate issues as needed.
• Monitor the implementation through strategies including one-on-one check-ins with division
leaders and surveys, and involve key stakeholders from the initiative outset to reduce risk
that cross-departmental stakeholders may not understand or follow new
processes/centralization measures. There may be operational challenges in the
consolidation, but ACOM’s willingness to accept and address feedback will be important.
Recommended steps for creating a single shared services IT team (future state):
• Confirm the number of positions to transfer to the centralized team (it is assumed all staff
would transfer, with the Help Desk staff pending transfer to TSS);
• Analyze impacts to cost allocation to ensure no loss of federal funding in this transition;
• Establish ongoing cadence of meetings with division leaders to discuss and prioritize their
needs on an ongoing basis;
• Develop a new organization chart under existing management team;
• Assess the skills of new staff and develop training plan;
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
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• Develop or procure resources for new managers (including supervisors) for CIO to use with
new direct reports, such as team-building activities and training;
• Review current application support and development processes using existing policies and
procedures with impacted staff;
• Revise process to reflect any process improvements and standardization elements;
• Develop job aids and refresher training to ensure consistent application of process across
all new staff;
• Conduct shadowing of new employees as a quality control strategy;
• Create/define or collect key performance measures related to application support for use in
establishing service levels/targets;
• Establish survey for division leaders to monitor their experience during the transition; and,
• Monitor ongoing impact of coordination/centralization and adapt as necessary.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Shift to a shared services
model for IT is one of ACOM’s top priorities for Arkansas Forward. This initiative will allow for
improved efficiencies through centralization of this process. ACOM already invests heavily in its
technology infrastructure; this will improve governance and project management of this function,
allowing the department to realize the benefits of this investment more fully.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: This
standardization will allow a central IT team to manage ACOM’s applications and portfolio of new
projects. Implementing standard IT project management protocols and tools (such as project
charters, business requirements documents, return on investment analysis) across all IT activities
and applications can bring rigor the development of new applications and support timely completion
of projects within budget. Efforts to improve the consistency in managing and reporting on
performance of existing applications will increase transparency. Training staff on the these best
practices will occur following centralization.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The expectation of this initiative is that through standardization, collaboration, and training, among
other benefits of centralization, ACOM’s Information Technology team will be able to improve the
efficiency and performance of the team. Examples of performance metrics that can be used to
measure this for the IT application team include:
• Percent of new projects completed on-time
• Percent of new projects completed on-budget
• Number of applications maintained by the department
• Application uptime for each core system (percent of time an application is available by staff
for use)
• Website uptime (percent of time website is available to the public)
The intent of these metrics is to establish clear service level expectations for each of the major
functions or processes performed by the IT division. For each metric, there should be a goal or
service level commitment that is developed by the IT team and signed off by ACOM leadership and
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the team should be accountable to develop a corrective action plan for any month when the
performance falls below the goal. For example, using an example above:
• Percent of new projects completed on-time (100%)
• Percent of new projects completed on-budget (100%)
Goals or targets can be set based on 1) statutory requirements, 2) historical performance with a
built-in expectation of process improvement, and 3) industry standards if applicable. Some of these
metrics may not be captured today and the division may wait to establish a goal until an initial
measure definition, data source, and historical performance (baseline) can be identified.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: ACOM-7 has an estimated savings of $270,000 based on ACOM estimates related
to the department’s ability to raise productivity of the dedicated employees performing IT functions.
Change Management Plan: It is not anticipated there will be significant opposition to this effort,
but it is recommended that the IT leader (CIO) devote upfront effort to engage the division leaders
about these changes and that the CIO have access to team training and teambuilding support to
help the new team form and becoming a high performing team. Figure 15 summarizes some of the
key activities for the communication plan; more detail is included in Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan.
Figure 15 – ACOM-7 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• You may be aware that ACOM is in the
Affected process of creating one central IT function Meeting with Missy
Division (for application management) impacted division Moreheart (CIO)
leaders and • The purpose of this integration is to allow leaders
Staff our staff to collaborate more fully, share
Division leader to
ideas and best practices, and improve our
meet with transferring
ability to serve our employee and leaders.
staff
• We will be establishing new commitments
to excellence for this function [describe New manager to
service levels]. outreach to
• [INSERT details] of proposed changes and transferring staff
timeline for changes.
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Initiative ACOM #8 - Consolidate financial operations to a central hub that uses
automated systems for budget tracking and expense management
This initiative continues ACOM’s move to shared services by consolidating financial and
procurement operations to a central hub that uses automated systems for budget tracking and
expense management, ensuring fiscal discipline and cost transparency within divisions.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Finance and Procurement staff are distributed
throughout ACOM’s divisions, due to the consolidation of legacy departments when ACOM was
formed in 2019. This structure poses some challenges including:
• Reduced line of sight to financial reporting for ACOM’s Secretary and Chief Financial Officer
(CFO);
• Potential for variation in practices; and,
• Lack of alignment around strategy.
Rationale: ACOM-8 advances ACOM’s shared services model by creating a centralized Finance
and Procurement team reporting to the department CFO. This centralization not only consolidates
staff but seeks to establish standard processes and use of one financial system. The organization
design proposed by ACOM would bring the Workforce Connections and Adult Rehabilitation Services
CFOs into the Finance and Procurement team through a direct reporting relationship and create a
dotted line reporting relationship to the CFOs for Banking/Securities, Insurance, and the Arkansas
Development Finance Authority.
Implementation Considerations: As was noted with ACOM-7, other Arkansas departments
such as Department of Human Services (DHS) have moved to a shared services model for HR and
offer some best practices for ACOM’s consideration. DHS initiated its move to shared services in
2015/2016 using a phased approach that eventually included creation of a shared services division.
Shared functions at DHS today include legal, procurement, facilities, mailroom, fleet, warehouse,
HR, and IT. Some of the contributing reasons behind the move to shared services were to reduce
duplication, provide greater line of sight for the Secretary into these functions, establish checks and
balances across divisions, resolve disconnected budgets, and generate efficiencies through a
dedicated team responsible for the functions. Some of the best practices DHS used included:
• Negotiated transfers with the departments to determine what worked best for each (in some
cases, took position authority but people remained in their divisions, in other cases, people
moved with the positions; there was a need to right-size how many full-time staff were
needed for the function, as many departments were utilizing multiple staff for these
functions but they were performing other duties);
• Established service levels for turnaround times for impacted function;
• Achieved service level improvements through training of new central staff to increase
professionalism and quality of work;
• Managed culture change by engaging directly with division directors. This included spending
significant face time exposing leadership to their points of contact, the process, and chain of
command, and ensuring they know they have access to more resources;
• Conducted surveys to monitor implementation;
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• Including former supervisors/stakeholders in the performance evaluations of central staff to
reinforce customer service expectations; and,
• Mangers conducted staff shadowing/observations for quality control.
To create a detailed plan for ACOM’s implementation of this initiative, a work session was held with
a combination of subject matter experts, led by the initiative owner, in July 2024. The session was
conducted using the Lean Six Sigma methodology by facilitator with a Six Sigma Black Belt. The
primary tools developed through this process included:
• Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, and Customers (SIPOC) diagram: This tool was used to
help transform the team’s mindset from viewing financial operations as discrete “things we
do” to viewing financial operations as a process with a beginning and end.
• Interference Diagram: This tool is used to generate obstacles/pain points of achieving the
vision from the Strategic Compass. The team diagrammed the goal of establishing a
centralized Finance and Procurement team and identified with key staff the obstacles/pain
points of establishing that framework. Then, the team ideated ways of overcoming those
obstacles. This tool is shown below in Figure 6.
• Strategic Path: This tool demonstrates the step-by-step process needed to implement the
goal (centralized Finance and Procurement team). Using sufficiency-based logic, the
facilitator leads the team through an exercise to list and sequence all the steps needed to
complete the task. They construct the plan in a thorough, deliberative manner. Once
complete, the plan is ready to be executed by the department. The steps developed in the
strategic path were converted from graphical form to narrative form, included below in the
steps to create the “Future State.” The Path developed by this team also includes specifically
when/how to reach out to IT along with other agencies, when to fill vacancies as a key focus,
data integrity, and a number of other key elements are specifically articulated that are critical
to success.
Typically, when process mapping is used, there is a “current state” for a given process that needs to
be morphed into a desired “future state.” However, when there is no “current state” (such as
contemplated here, where a central team is implemented), the effort is different. In this case,
identification of the major obstacles is a primary focus of the planning effort. It is critical to work
with staff closest to the work to identify obstacles that need to be overcome to implement the
project. These staff are best qualified to identify these hurdles and to ideate ways to overcome,
mitigate, or work around those obstacles.
Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with ACOM staff include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Some division CFOs are positions funded using federal funds. These staff will continue to
report directly to their division leader, with a dotted line into the central finance and
procurement team. The intent is for these staff to benefit from best practices and
collaboration with the finance and procurement staff, while avoiding any issues for the
department with its cost allocation and adhering federal requirements.
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• There could be Finance and Procurement staff attrition in the centralization if staff are unsure
of the intent of or impact of the centralization. Execution of a communication plan will be
important to avoiding this turnover.
Additional risks to address were identified by staff and are summarized in Figure 16. The red boxes
are barriers or risk the staff identified that could prevent them from achieving the goal of a centralized
team. The team also addressed solutions to these barriers (shown in green), which have been
accounted for in the implementation plan.
Figure 16 – ACOM-8 Interference Diagram
Source: Completed with ACOM staff in work session in July 2024.
The establishment of a Shared Services Finance and Procurement team presents a complex
challenge due to a myriad of interferences. Overcoming these obstacles requires a multifaceted
approach involving financial, operational, and organizational strategies, as identified by staff:
• One of the primary hurdles is the absence of a dedicated appropriation for Shared Services
operations. To address this, implementing a time-tracking system to allocate salary costs
across divisions is proposed. Additionally, utilizing the Personnel Activity Report in
conjunction with the EASE system to accurately record payroll data can provide valuable
insights. Simultaneously, developing a cost allocation methodology to secure approval from
federal entities is crucial. This will enable the disbursement of salaries and funding for the
Shared Services team. Until that point is reached, ACOM will use dotted lines to keep the
CFOs involved in federal programs embedded in their division but connected to the Finance
and Procurement Team.
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• Standardization of processes and systems emerges as another significant challenge. The
diverse IT systems across divisions hinder efficient reporting. To rectify this, conducting work
sessions to identify and implement best practices for each system is recommended.
• Furthermore, inconsistent forms and processes across business areas pose difficulties.
Similar to the IT systems, work sessions can be held to establish standardized approaches.
• Resistance to change and the loss of institutional knowledge are significant organizational
hurdles. To mitigate these challenges, a grassroots approach involving impacted staff in the
analysis and decision-making processes is suggested. Sharing a detailed consolidation plan
can also address concerns and build trust. To ensure the continuity of expertise, balancing
subject matter experts and shared services roles is essential. Implementing robust training
and knowledge transfer programs can equip new employees with the necessary skills.
• The integration of data from various sources, including legacy systems and external data,
presents complexities. To address this, incorporating relevant data into the next version of
the AASIS system is an option. Additionally, developing reporting capabilities within the
S4HANA-SAP cost allocation system can provide valuable insights.
Recommended steps for creating a single shared services Finance and Procurement team
(future state):
The steps for the future Finance and Procurement team were collaboratively created with consultant
support and a team of Finance Staff. Known as the “Strategic Path,” the team conducted a deliberate
exercise to brainstorm and sequence applicable tasks.
• Collect existing polices and procedures from the different Finance and Procurement units.
• Identify staff from across Finance and Procurement teams to participate in process mapping
and re-engineering sessions (core group part of facilitated session to be used where
possible, with addition of outside division Finance and Procurement staff). Some example
sub-processes include invoicing vendors, managing purchases, and completing
month/quarter/annual financial reporting.
• Utilize existing process used by core Finance team to facilitate discussion with combined
team about any modifications that should be made based on best practices used in other
divisions. Identify commonalities in process and redundancies. Three enabling factors to
ensure the success of this effort include:
o Include identified staff;
o Obtain buy-in from Commerce leadership; and,
o Fill key vacant positions.
• Organize central Finance and Procurement team into functional teams that align with the
new centralized structure (these teams are contemplated in the new organization chart
shown in ACOM-0, i.e, with Procurement, Controller, Budget), defining clear roles and
responsibilities.
• Develop team protocols.
o Identify best practices for each functional area based on mapping process.
o Draft new team policies and procedures. These processes should be standardized
where possible and have variance where necessary.
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• Using work session results, determine if existing systems meet Finance and Procurement
division’s needs or if a new solution is necessary. Consider the potential to consolidate
systems for the following functions:
o Grants management;
o Dashboard;
o Travel expenses;
o Review/signature;
o Standardized reporting for each division;
o Fleet; and,
o EASE/STA timekeeping.
• Evaluate and select a centralized reporting system that best meets requirements of
centralized operations, emphasizing features that support transparency and fiscal
discipline.
o Determine project manager to help lead the implementation effort.
o Create proposal and obtain Secretary McDonald feedback (show how prior feedback
has been addressed).
• Work closely with IT to integrate the new financial system with existing division systems,
ensuring seamless data flow and accessibility.
o Regularly conduct data checks to ensure integrity.
• Migrate financial data from decentralized systems to the centralized platform for the grants
management system, conducting thorough checks to maintain data integrity.
o Select a division to participate in pilot – likely to be a smaller division that is easier to
manage during the transition.
o Develop key metrics for each division (common metrics, and unique).
o Plan the pilot: transition, timeline, measurement of success.
o Obtain system documentation from the developer, if applicable.
o Learn to extract or generate reports (based on level of automation), based on metrics
identified.
• Launch a pilot phase within selected division to test the effectiveness of the centralized
financial hub and new software.
o Conduct regular check-ins with pilot department staff to gather feedback.
o Evaluate data integrity.
o Adjust full-scale implementation plan based on feedback.
o Adjust data migration for any integrity issues.
• Develop comprehensive training program for all financial staff.
• Monitor the pilot closely, gathering feedback and making necessary adjustments before
proceeding with full roll-out.
• Deploy training with roll-out (not significantly before).
• Complete implementation.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Shift to a shared services
model for finance and procurement is one of ACOM’s top priorities for Arkansas Forward. This
initiative will allow for improved efficiencies through centralization of this process (fewer full-time
resources may be required to administer services than when the function is decentralized).
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Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: The
consolidation of the Finance and Procurement team is less of a challenge for ACOM than the
complex work of reviewing and standardizing finance and procurement processes. While standard
processes exist for the core team (employee records and onboarding), there are variations within
some of ACOM’s divisions. Identifying these instances and training staff on the new standard
process will be more time consuming for the newly formed HR team.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The expectation of this initiative is that through standardization, collaboration, and training, among
other benefits of centralization, ACOM’s Finance and Procurement team will be able to improve the
efficiency and performance of the team. Examples of service level metrics that can be used to
measure this for various finance and procurement functions and transactions include:
• Average days to payment for invoices
• Time to close (quarterly or monthly)
• Error rate for financial reporting
• Timeliness of completion of financial reports
The intent of these metrics is to establish clear service level expectations for each of the major
functions or processes performed by the Finance and Procurement division. For each metric, there
should be a goal or service level commitment that is developed by the Finance and Procurement
team and signed off by ACOM leadership and the team should be accountable to develop a
corrective action plan for any month when the performance falls below the goal. For example, using
an example above:
• Average days to payment for invoices (95% within 30 business days)
Goals or targets can be set based on 1) statutory requirements, 2) historical performance with a
built-in expectation of process improvement, and 3) industry standards if applicable. Some of these
metrics may not be captured today and the division may wait to establish a goal until an initial
measure definition, data source, and historical performance (baseline) can be identified.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: ACOM-8 has an estimated savings of $100,000 based on ACOM estimates related
to the department’s ability to raise productivity of the dedicated employees performing Finance and
Procurement functions.
Change Management Plan: It is not anticipated there will be significant opposition to this effort,
but it is recommended that the CO leader and the Chief of Staff devote upfront effort to engage the
division leaders about these changes and that the CFO leader have access to team training and
teambuilding support to help the new team form and becoming a high performing team. Figure 17
summarizes some of the key activities for the communication plan; more detail is included in
Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
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Figure 17 – ACOM-24 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• You may be aware that ACOM is in the
Affected process of creating one central finance and Meeting with Tammy
Division procurement team. impacted division Williams, CFO
leaders and • The purpose of this integration is to allow leaders
Staff our staff to collaborate more fully, share
Division leader to
ideas and best practices, and improve our
meet with transferring
ability to serve our employee and leaders.
staff
• We will be establishing new commitments
to excellence for this function [describe New manager to
service levels]. outreach to
• [INSERT details] of proposed changes and transferring staff
timeline for changes.
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Initiative ACOM #23 - Optimize AEDC functional ownership by determining which
existing teams should be part of Workforce Connection and ADFA
This initiative directs ACOM to optimize the Arkansas Economic Development Commission (AEDC)
functional ownership by determining which aspects of the AEDC should operate as part of Workforce
Connection and transfer the management of the bond guarantee program from AEDC to ADFA.
Initiative Overview and Current State: AEDC conducts business engagement activities for the
purpose of supporting business development. Workforce Connections also engages businesses for
the purpose of identifying opportunities for job seekers and offering incentives for businesses to
build and maintain a skilled workforce. Although the purpose of this engagement differs for AEDC
and Workforce Connections, the result is potentially duplicative.
Rationale: The Executive Director of AEDC has identified potential duplicative functions between
some of the business engagement staff at AEDC and Workforce Connections. In addition to other
organization changes contemplated (see ACOM-0), AEDC and Workforce Connection leadership
have agreed to transfer a team from the existing business division to Workforce Connections to
clarify the responsibility. With remaining staff at AEDC, a new “Regional Engagement Team” will be
developed, modelled after Missouri’s organization structure.
In addition, there is an opportunity to transfer the management of the bond guarantee program from
AEDC to the Arkansas Development Finance Authority (ADFA). This would not involve a staff transfer
but would better align with ADFA’s duties.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan provides the action steps in
the recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with ACOM staff include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• AEDC needs support for communication and change management regarding staff moves.
Because an entire team is moving including its manager, there are some mitigating factors.
However, working for AEDC is a point of pride and some may oppose the transfer. There is a
need for the impacted leaders to understand the “why” behind moves and to support change
in their conversations with staff (may need one-pagers or frequently asked questions).
Recommended steps for transferring AEDC staff and functions (future state):
• Analyze current functions within Department AEDC to determine which should be realigned
to Workforce Connection, based on efficiency gains and strategic fit (complete)
• Engage with leaders and key personnel from Workforce Connection (complete)
• Create a detailed transition plan for each function moving to Workforce Connection and for
the bond guarantee program moving to ADFA, outlining all required steps, roles, and
timelines
• Present the operational process change plan to Secretary McDonald for approval and
feedback
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
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• Consult with legal and compliance teams to ensure all aspects of the transition adhere to
legal standards and departmental policies, and prepare any necessary documentation or
agreements
• Coordinate with IT to adjust systems and migrate necessary data to support the realigned
functions and bond guarantee program effectively
• Implement the transfer of designated functions and the bond guarantee program according
to the transition plans. Conduct a final review of the transition process with the Directors and
make any final adjustments as necessary
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This change better aligns
with AEDC and Workforce Connections’ responsibilities and removes duplication of internal
resources and external confusion about these functions.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: Once
the transfers have occurred for both the business development staff and the bond guarantee
program, Workforce Connections and AEDC could implement process changes but they are
indeterminate at this time.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
This initiative is designed to ensure completion of an organizational change, to address duplicative
functions in two divisions and best align these functions with the appropriate division. As such, the
primary metric to evaluate the success of this initiative is the milestone reflecting the successful
completion of this task. On an ongoing basis, other data such as satisfaction of the external
stakeholders (businesses) engaged by the Workforce Connection Team can be used as well as
improvements in the Workforce Connection division’s performance on its key performance
measures.
• Executed/complete transfer of designated functions to Department Workforce Connection
and the bond guarantee program to Department ADFA within the project timeline.
• Satisfaction rate of businesses engaged by Workforce Connections Team.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: This initiative is not anticipated to result in cost savings. It is an enabling
recommendation to allow ACOM to align its organization structure efficiently.
Change Management Plan: Key communication activities are included in Figure 18 and in
Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan.
Figure 18 – ACOM-23 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• Existing business staff have been identified
Impacted for transfer to Workforce Connections. Face-to-face meetings Clint O’Neal
staff • This change is occurring to help us to better with current and new
Impacted
focus on business engagement activities leader.
manager
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
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Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
and eliminate confusion in roles and Team meeting.
responsibilities.
• There is a place for you on this team.
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Initiative ACOM #24 - Consolidate HR to a central hub that uses automated systems
to reduce over-processing and inefficiency
This initiative continues ACOM’s move to shared services by consolidating human resources (HR) to
a central hub that uses automated systems for employee records and payroll processing, ensuring
compliance and transparency to reduce over-processing and inefficiency, and fix processes to drive
more effective recruitment strategies to enhance Commerce’s competitive edge.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Human resources staff are distributed throughout
ACOM’s divisions, as a result of the combination of legacy departments when ACOM was formed in
2019. As a result, there are significant variations in how they operate:
• Compliance with policy: Compliance with Office of Personnel policy as well as internal
ACOM policy may vary by division. Preliminary process mapping revealed some of these
differences but they must be documented more comprehensively as part of the
consolidation.
• Experience: Individuals serving in HR roles across ACOM differ in their level of experience.
This may result in differences in how matters are addressed by division.
• Training: Staff are funded using different sources and divisions may offer different training
opportunities. Not all divisions can afford to invest in the professional development of their
HR staff, which could be remedied on a combined team.
• Systems: Staff use different systems across ACOM divisions for functions such as time
keeping. Today, staff are using SRS in some divisions and there is a desire for all to use EASE.
Rationale: ACOM-24 creates a shared services team (reporting to the Chief of Staff) with
responsibility for all HR functions. This centralization not only consolidates staff, but seeks to
establish standard processes and use of one HR system. Figures 19 – 21 show the high level process
for key HR activities; the goal with the consolidation is to map the detailed flow for each process with
the combined HR team, identify improvements based on the experience of staff, and train the team
on these improvements.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
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Figure 19 – Employee Records High Level Process Flow
Source: Prepared in work session with ACOM staff in June 2024.
Figure 20 – Employee Payments Processing High-Level Process Flow
Source: Prepared in work session with ACOM staff in June 2024.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
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Figure 21 – Employee Time Entry Process Flow
Source: Source: Prepared in work session with ACOM staff in June 2024.
Implementation Considerations: Other Arkansas departments such as Department of Human
Services (DHS) have moved to a shared services model for HR and offer some best practices for
ACOM’s consideration. DHS initiated its move to shared services in 2015/2016 using a phased
approach that eventually included creation of a shared services division. Shared functions at DHS
today include legal, procurement, facilities, mailroom, fleet, warehouse, HR, and IT. Some of the
contributing reasons behind the move to shared services were to reduce duplication, provide greater
line of sight for the Secretary into these functions, establish checks and balances across divisions,
resolve disconnected budgets, and generate efficiencies through a dedicated team responsible for
the functions. Some of the best practices DHS used include:
• When ready to take a function, took everything including staff
• Negotiated transfers with the departments to determine what worked best for each (in some
cases, took position authority but people remained in their divisions, in other cases, people
moved with the positions; there was a need to right-size how many full-time staff were
needed for the function, as many departments were utilizing multiple staff for these
functions but they were performing other duties).
• Established service levels for turnaround times for impacted function.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
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• Achieved service level improvements through training of new central staff to increase
professionalism and quality of work.
• Managed culture change by engaging directly with division directors. This included spending
significant face time exposing leadership to their points of contact, the process, and chain of
command, and ensuring they know they have access to more resources.
• Conducted surveys to monitor implementation.
• Including former supervisors/stakeholders in the performance evaluations of central staff to
reinforce customer service expectations.
• Mangers conducted staff shadowing/observations for quality control.
To create a detailed plan for ACOM’s implementation of this initiative, two work sessions were held
with a combination of subject matter experts, led by the initiative owner, in June and July 2024. These
sessions were conducted using the Lean Six Sigma methodology by facilitator with a Six Sigma Black
Belt. The sessions included HR leadership and staff who are closest to the work, who are best
qualified to identify implementation hurdles and to ideate ways to overcome, mitigate, or work
around those obstacles.
The three primary tools developed through this process included:
• Strategic Compasses: This tool is used to craft a vision of “what good looks like” for a given
process. It was used in this case to establish a shared vision for centralizing HR, and three
mission critical HR sub-processes identified by staff (onboarding, payroll, and employee
records processes). This tool builds consensus for process improvement and is used to find
the primary bottlenecks in the process(es).
o Note: In discussions, the team identified examples of division differences in
practice. One example highlighted was the Legacy Division of Workforce Services
Value Stream Map, which is unnecessarily different from the way the rest of the
division HR staff operate.
• Interference Diagram: This tool is used to generate obstacles/pain points of achieving the
vision from the Strategic Compass. The team diagrammed the goal of establishing a
centralized HR team and identified with key staff the obstacles/pain points of establishing
that framework. Then, the team ideated ways of overcoming those obstacles. This tool is
shown below in Figure 12.
• Strategic Path: This tool demonstrates the step-by-step process needed to implement the
goal (centralized HR team). Using sufficiency-based logic, the facilitator leads the team
through an exercise to list and sequence all the steps needed to complete the task. They
construct the plan in a thorough, deliberative manner. Once complete, the plan is ready to
be executed by the department. The steps developed in the strategic path were converted
from graphical form to narrative form, included below in the steps to create the “Future
State.”
Understanding that once the HR team becomes centralized, there will be a need to review and
improve on existing HR processes, as well as train the entire time to adhere to one set of
requirements. To help to prepare the department for this exercise, the facilitator and team reviewed
the existing processes for the three mission critical HR processes, which were already documented
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
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by the team. The goal as noted in the work plan below, is to use these existing process flows to review
the key activities for each process with the newly formed, centralized team to:
1) Identify variances across divisions that should be eliminated;
2) Identify any process improvements used in some divisions that can be made part of the
standard process and replicated across the entire department; and,
3) Use the experience of the team to identify any other process improvements.
Once the team completes this effort, it can turn to additional HR processes and replicate the activity.
Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with ACOM staff include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• There could be HR staff attrition in the centralization if staff are unsure of the intent of or
impact of the centralization. Execution of a communication plan will be important to avoiding
this turnover.
• Devoting time and resources to process improvement and ongoing standardization of
process will be the ongoing work for the team once it is formed. Moving the staff to one team
is only the first step.
• Additional risks to address were identified by staff and are summarized in Figure 22
(interference diagram). The red boxes are barriers or risk the staff identified that could
prevent them from achieving the goal of a centralized team. The team also addressed
solutions to these barriers (shown in green), which have been accounted for in the
implementation plan.
Figure 22 – HR Consolidation Interference Diagram
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
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Source: Source: Prepared in work session with ACOM staff in June 2024.
Recommended steps for creating a single shared services HR team (future state):
The steps for the future Human Resources team were collaboratively created with consultant
support and a team of Human Resources. Known as the “Strategic Path,” the team conducted a
deliberate exercise to brainstorm and sequence applicable tasks.
• Develop a communication plan to engage division leaders and impacted HR staff moving to
the centralized team.
• Conduct workshops with HR representatives from all divisions to map current business
processes and identify differences by department, including inefficiencies and
redundancies.
o Identify all current HR processes and systems in use.
o Assess the different processes and systems based on state requirements and
federal funds tracking requirements to drive decisions about standardization.
• In parallel, brief OPM on ACOM’s plan and efforts to obtain feedback.
• Develop a new standardized set of HR processes, particularly for employee records, payroll
processing, disciplinary process, and recruiting, that align with the strategic goals of the
organization and fit the consolidated structure.
o HR director should assign groups/teams to address each category of process (share
the workload).
o HR director and working team to review each area and propose a process, structure,
and define roles and responsibilities.
o Team should map existing staff to roles, identifying gaps and staffing needs.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
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o HR director approves roles and responsibilities and obtain approval/feedback from
Chief of Staff.
o At this step, the team should brief Secretary McDonald of progress and update OPM
on efforts.
• Redefine roles and responsibilities within HR team to fit the new centralized structure,
establishing a clear chain of command. Update policies to reflect the new processes and
structure, ensuring compliance and clear communication across the department.
• Re-examine current IT systems based on new policies/processes and roles/responsibilities.
o Assess needs and determine if they can be met by existing systems or if a new
solution is needed.
o If needed, identify and evaluate HR systems that best support the newly optimized
processes and teams focusing on functionality that enhances efficiency and
effectiveness.
o Identify costs related to the new system and implementation/configuration.
o If systems/solutions are changed, develop training materials for staff and integrate
into polices and procedures.
o At this step, the team should brief Secretary McDonald of progress and update OPM
on efforts.
• Configure new systems to ACOM’s needs and integrate with its infrastructure.
o IT develops data migration plan.
o IT execute data migration plan.
o Conduct testing and quality assurance activities.
• Develop staff training:
o Develop training around new instructions for HR staff using maps, standard
operating procedures, and case scenarios.
o Obtain and develop training from software vendors or custom-built solutions.
o Develop training for non-HR staff on how to engage with HR staff.
• Conduct training for HR staff on new processes and software, ensuring everyone is
competent and comfortable with the changes. Reinforce new process maps.
• Conduct any training for impacted staff outside HR on new processes and how to engage
with the newly centralized team.
o Conduct training sessions and develop resources such as short narratives or video
tutorials.
o Announcement from Secretary McDonald to kickstart implementation.
• Schedule launch of new processes/tools.
• Execute communication campaign for launch of new processes/tools.
• Launch new centralized HR structure and software systems organization-wide.
• Monitor the implementation. Consider use of surveys for stakeholders (customers of HR,
such as division leaders).
• Establish training plans for staffs based on adherence to new processes and needed skill-
development.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Shift to a shared services
model for HR is one of ACOM’s top priorities for Arkansas Forward. This initiative will allow for
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
43
improved efficiencies through centralization of this process (fewer full-time resources may be
required to administer services than when the function is decentralized).
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: The
consolidation of the HR team is less of a challenge for ACOM than the complex work of reviewing
and standardizing HR processes. While standard processes exist for the core team (employee
records and onboarding) and policy is driven by TSS Office of Personnel Management, there are
variations within some of ACOM’s divisions. For example, within the time keeping function, ACOM
will shift from use of multiple systems to the single EASE system, which will change processes for
impacted divisions. Identifying these instances and training staff on the new standard process will
be more time consuming for the newly formed HR team.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The expectation of this initiative is that through standardization, collaboration, and training, among
other benefits of centralization, ACOM’s Human Resources team will be able to improve the
efficiency and performance of the team. Examples of service level metrics that can be used to
measure this for various human resources functions and transactions include:
• Average number of days from position request submission to job posting
• Cost per hire
• Time to fill vacant positions
• Percent of new employees onboarded using current process
• Percent of new employees receiving mandatory training within X days of hire
The intent of these metrics is to establish clear service level expectations for each of the major
functions or processes performed by the Human Resources department. For each metric, there
should be a goal or service level commitment that is developed by the HR team and signed off by
ACOM leadership and the team should be accountable to develop a corrective action plan for any
month when the performance falls below the goal. For example, using an example above:
• Average number of days from position request submission to job posting (95% within 5
business days)
Goals or targets can be set based on 1) statutory requirements, 2) historical performance with a
built-in expectation of process improvement, and 3) industry standards if applicable. Some of these
metrics may not be captured today and the division may wait to establish a goal until an initial
measure definition, data source, and historical performance (baseline) can be identified.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: ACOM-24 has an estimated savings of $120,000 based on ACOM estimates related
to the department’s ability to raise productivity of the dedicated employees performing HR
functions.
Change Management Plan: It is not anticipated there will be significant opposition to this effort,
but it is recommended that the HR leader and the Chief of Staff devote upfront effort to engage the
division leaders about these changes and that the HR leader have access to team training and
teambuilding support to help the new team form and becoming a high performing team. Figure 23
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
44
summarizes some of the key activities for the communication plan; more detail is included in
Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan. Note that in multiple places, it is assumed the ACOM team would
add specific details related to the logistics of the consolidation.
Figure 23 – ACOM-24 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• You may be aware that ACOM is in the
All Staff process of creating one central human Staff emails Communication
resources team. Team
All hands meetings
• The purpose of this integration is to allow
our staff to collaborate more fully, share
ideas and best practices, and improve our
ability to serve our employee and leaders.
• Summary of how integration will impact
employees including proposed timeline for
changes, changes in terms of retirement of
any systems, and final agreed service levels
to demonstrate commitment to customer
service.
• You may be aware that ACOM is in the
Affected process of creating one central human Meeting with Communication
Division resources team. impacted division Team
leaders and • The purpose of this integration is to allow leaders
Staff our staff to collaborate more fully, share
Division leader to
ideas and best practices, and improve our
meet with transferring
ability to serve our employee and leaders.
staff
• We will be establishing new commitments
to excellence for this function [describe New manager to
service levels – as example, commitment to outreach to
post new job openings within X days of
transferring staff
submission].
• Summary of how integration will impact
employees including proposed timeline for
changes, and changes in terms of
retirement of any systems.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
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Initiative ACOM #25 - Effectively integrate the Banking and Securities teams to most
effectively leverage the strengths of both orgs
This initiative aims to seamlessly integrate the Banking and Securities divisions to leverage the
strengths of both organizations effectively and eliminate redundancies. The focus is on creating a
cohesive unit that maximizes efficiencies and enhances the delivery of services through a well-
structured merger plan.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Arkansas State Bank Department was created in
1913 by Act 113. Responsibilities include regulating state-charted commercial banks (72 banks with
assets exceeding $164 billion, June 30, 2024). The department supervises holding companies of
Arkansas state-charted banks; state-chartered trust companies; regional and county industrial
development corporations; industrial loan institutions; and capital development companies. The
department’s mission is to “ensure the safety and soundness of, and public confidence in, these
institutions and organizations.”
The Arkansas Securities Department was created in 1959 by Act 254. Responsibilities have evolved
but currently include oversight of the securities industry, non-depository mortgage lending industry,
money services industry, state-chartered credit union industry, and state-chartered savings and
loan industry. The mission of this organization is to “Promote an environment in which the securities
and financial markets within the department’s jurisdiction function efficiently and without
unnecessary regulatory impediments and in which the Department protects the financial well-being
of Arkansas citizens through effective consumer protection and education.”
The Arkansas State Bank Department and Arkansas Securities Department were consolidated within
the newly formed ACOM in 2019 by Act 910. In recognition of improvements to operations from
combining these functions, as well as administrative efficiencies, ACOM recently moved both
divisions under a single leader and is in the initial stages of integrating these functions. While the
organization chart reflects consolidation, these functions are not otherwise merged. There is
significant growth in the industry, reflecting the need for an effective and collaborative division.
Rationale: ACOM-25 seeks to more fully integrate these divisions at ACOM. Although there are
efficiencies expected from this structure, the primary reason for the integration is to achieve better
collaboration between these teams, to allow for sharing of best practices, and to create more
effective business processes (such as adopting similar practices for comparable situations and
creating more similarities in the stakeholder experience).
ACOM is navigating the best manner to interact with stakeholders; there may be instances to
maintain two separate entities externally. The department is considering a rebranded division name,
which it would formally propose and seek approval for using the legislative process.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan provides the action steps in
the recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with ACOM staff include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
46
• Staff retention during this time of transition is important, given the specialized nature of the
work performed by both divisions and the long training time required to replace staff.
Discussion of the importance to retain staff was identified as a need during staff interviews.
Establishing a retention plan to support this transition (using strategies such as retention
bonuses, staff recognition programs, and establishing a feedback mechanism to capture
ongoing staff input about the consolidation) will support this transition.
• There are some confidentiality, security, and privacy considerations governing Banking and
Securities, that must be accounted for as these divisions contemplate systems integration.
Although IT staff indicate they are not interested in aggregating data, any IT solution
developed must be multi-tenant and comply with laws and regulations governing both
divisions.
• As these divisions integrate, there is also a need to address some emerging areas in the
industry where regulation has not been formalized (e.g., non-depository applications like
PayPal, Venmo, and Square, which are used to pay bills and can keep a cash balance). There
are no federal protections and very little oversight of these entities.
Recommended steps for integrating the Banking and Securities divisions (future state):
• Create a cross-functional integration project team with representatives from both
organizations, to include leadership and frontline staff.
• Create a staff retention plan to support retention of key roles, to include the use of monetary
(6-month or 1-year retention bonus for key staff) and non-monetary incentives to retain staff
(work schedule flexibility, remote work).
• Conduct individual interviews with leaders and key personnel from both departments to
understand unique strengths, weaknesses, and operational methods.
• Analyze existing organizational charts for opportunities for consolidation around functional
areas.
• Use the cross-functional team to conduct cross-training of each group of staff about the key
processes used by the other division. Conduct process mapping to document the “as is”
critical business processes used by each department. Identify opportunities for process
improvement and re-engineering.
• Conduct interviews with key customer groups from both Banking (including a sample of the
73 state banks and staff from public-facing consumer complaint area) and Securities (a
sample of securities firms, non-bank mortgage, and money transmission) to gather insights
into their experiences and expectations.
• Review statutory and regulatory restrictions to ensure all changes are compliant with state
and federal regulations.
• Develop a phased approach for merging critical data systems like customer databases and
financial systems including rigorous testing phases to ensure data integrity and system
functionality.
• Analyze if there is an opportunity to merge software business functions.
• Design a multi-tiered communication plan that addresses different stakeholder groups,
ensuring tailored messages that resonate with each group’s concerns and roles. Use
communication plan to launch new branding of the division.
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• Implement training programs to familiarize all employees with new procedures and systems,
providing more detailed training to impacted staff. Create job aids and other resources to
support implementation of changes.
• Use a multi-phased approach to test integration by “piloting” integration with certain
functions and impacted staff.
• Use employee feedback mechanisms to monitor staff perceptions throughout the
integration. This could include use of short pulse surveys, discussion in team meetings, or
focus groups.
• Work with the Arkansas Legislature to update statutes to reflect new branding/naming
convention.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: ACOM’s chief priority in
Arkansas Forward is to create the most agile, effective organization. Consolidation of Banking and
Securities has already occurred, and this initiative implements this integration more fully, allowing
ACOM to realize the benefits of this integration beyond the initial cost savings.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: As the
cross-functional team reviews the processes used by each division and gains familiarity with these
processes through cross-training, opportunities to reengineer processes will occur. For example,
the manner in which one division engages with external stakeholders may change as a result of
applying best practices used by the other division.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The expectation of this initiative is that through the true integration of the Securities and Banking
Teas, team performance will improve, staff collaboration will be increased, and external
stakeholders will experience benefits from improved internal operations and consistent
engagement of stakeholders. Examples of metrics include:
• Staff retention (during and after full integration time period)
• Percent of staff from one legacy division who are cross-trained in the work of the other;
• Percent of existing business processes reviewed for improvement and collaboration
Goals or targets can be set based leadership expectations (with time-bound examples provided)
• 100% staff retention for first year of integration
• 75% staff cross-trained by March 2025
• 100% of business processes reviewed for integration by December 2024
These are not metrics otherwise captured today, and so metric definition, data source, and the
manual process for calculation is needed.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: ACOM-25 has already resulted in a cost savings of $250,000. Additional savings are
not anticipated.
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Change Management Plan: Staff are already aware of the consolidation of these divisions, but as
further organizational changes are made or process changes are implemented, communicating
those changes to staff will be important in supporting change management.
The Banking and Securities divisions serve unique clients. Consolidation of these divisions and
potential changes to their operations will impact stakeholders. Feedback from stakeholders should
be captured and addressed through the implementation of this initiative. ACOM will need to rebrand
the organizations and work with the Arkansas Legislature to update the authorizing statues of the
departments to reflect the branding change. Figure 24 summarizes some of the key activities for the
communication plan; more detail is included in Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan.
Figure 24 – ACOM-25 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• You may be aware that ACOM has
All Staff consolidated the Banking and Securities Staff emails Communication
divisions. As we continue to integrate the Team
All hands meetings
operations of these two distinct divisions,
we will communicate any organizational or
process changes transparently.
• The purpose of this integration is to allow
our staff to collaborate more fully, share
ideas and best practices, and improve our
ability to perform our mission.
• NOTE to ACOM Team: Once the specific
timeline and integration steps are known,
they should be added to future
communications. ACOM can consider
frequently asked questions to respond to
potential questions.
• You may be aware that ACOM has
Public consolidated the Banking and Securities Social media, Communication
divisions. As we continue to integrate the website, and press Team
operations of these two distinct divisions, releases, stakeholder
we will communicate any organizational or emails, stakeholder
process changes transparently. meetings (all
• The purpose of this integration is to allow channels).
our staff to collaborate more fully, share
ideas and best practices, and improve our
ability to perform our mission in service of
our stakeholders.
• [INSERT details] of proposed changes.
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Operational Efficiencies
Initiative ACOM #5 - Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business
critical/duplicative applications across all divisions of Commerce
This effort could be accomplished in a phased approach:
1. Initial assessment to gather application data and walk through assessment criteria (e.g.,
business criticality)
2. Identify and finalize candidate applications
3. Sunset plan and timeline for each application
4. Track value capture with TSS (e.g., reduction or reinvestment of contract hours)
Initiative Overview and Current State: To fulfill its mission, ACOM’s divisions have built and
purchased many applications to support business needs. Today, ACOM maintains approximately 74
major applications, based on a recent assessment completed by Information Technology resources
and an external consulting team.
ACOM continues to invest in its technology infrastructure. ACOM currently maintains a portfolio of
approximately seven major projects, summarized in Figure 25. Collectively, these projects
represent an investment of approximately $41.9. million in ACOM’s technology infrastructure (total
project budget).
Figure 25 – Current ACM IT Projects 2024
Note: The total budgeted spend is over the life of the project.
Source: Arkansas Department of Commerce.
Excluding these investments, analysis of these ACOM’s existing applications found additional
opportunities for improvement:
4 opportunities to retire an application
2 opportunities to modernize (replace or upgrade) an application
Rationale: Initiative ACOM-5 directs ACOM to develop a strategy for the coordinated replacement
and retirement of non-business critical and duplicative applications given that:
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Aging applications, particularly those that continue to be operated by third parties, are more
expensive to maintain;
There is an opportunity to streamline applications and replace legacy systems; and,
Multiple, overlapping applications require additional staff, expertise, and funding to support
and require add to the complexity of training new staff (i.e., across human resources staff
across ACOM’s divisions, multiple tools are used for time entry including the STA and EASE
systems).
In addition to these applications, ACOM may realize additional savings from review of software
licenses and software as a service subscriptions (such as Adobe). For example, in switching its
Telephony system to a Transformation and Shared Services Division of Information Systems (DIS)-
sponsored solution, ACOM achieved a significant per license savings.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan provides the action steps in
the recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with ACOM staff include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• One challenge ACOM may confront relates to its use of federal funding and blending funding
across programs or divisions. Certain funds may be limited to certain purposes. ACOM
should complete an impact assessment of the effect of any proposed system
retirement/replacement on available funding, identify and restrictions to funding uses, and
implement mitigation strategies accordingly. For example, ACOM, once it has identified
funding that will no longer be needed due to system retirement, can seek to amend the
federal application for funding or grant to redirect the same funds to support the new line of
focus and business activities.
Recommended steps for replacing and retiring ACOM legacy systems future state:
• Establish a review process to prioritize applications for replacement and retirement.
• Conduct an assessment of software as a service licenses by division to inform next steps.
• Identify and prioritize applications for replacement. Consider costs to maintain, number of
staff and external stakeholders impacted, and other criteria (complete).
• Research potential market solutions to replace these applications to determine if ACOM will
purchase or build the replacements.
• For high priority applications identified and prioritized, complete a high-level order of
magnitude analysis to identify expected costs and benefits (return on investment) from
replacement and identify resource needs.
• Complete an impact assessment on any federal funding stream and analyze impact to cost
allocation. Identify mitigating strategies so Arkansas does not lose federal funding.
• Create a plan to summarize roadmap of expected applications for retirement over next two
years.
• Present the streamlined applications plan to Secretary McDonald for approval and feedback.
• Present plan to colleagues at TSS DIS for feedback and to ensure alignment with statewide
strategy.
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• Identify funding needs and availability.
• Gather requirements to replace impacted applications.
• Impacted ACOM divisions should map the “as is” and “to be” processes impacted by the
application to identify opportunities to streamline its work.
• For each application, develop a project plan.
• Negotiate any contracts with software vendors for the new solutions, ensuring favorable
terms and compliance with state procurement guidelines.
• Develop a communication plan to inform stakeholders of the replacement timeline.
• Develop training resources for internal and external users (videos, tutorials, frequently asked
questions).
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: As noted, ACOM has
invested and continues to prioritize in the modernization of its technology infrastructure to ensure
its divisions can execute on their mission. Significant cost savings opportunity has been identified to
retire and replace certain applications and establishment of an ongoing process will ensure ACOM
continues to achieve these efficiencies.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: As
ACOM builds new applications, particularly when creating new functionality for the public such as a
public-facing portal, there is an opportunity for manual business processes to be replaced by more
efficient, technology-enabled processes. Each division impacted by an application process should
use process mapping to document the current process as a baseline and solution with the team how
introduction of the new technology capabilities may inform process improvement. This work should
occur in parallel to requirements gathering to inform design of the new application.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The expectation of this initiative is that ACOM will be able to sunset duplicative and aging
applications as well as potentially reduce unnecessary or duplicative software as a service licenses,
resulting a cost-savings to the department. Proposed process metrics include:
• Reduction in the number of active IT applications
• Decrease in annual IT expenditures by optimizing software licenses and maintenance costs
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: Based on initial estimates, ACOM-5 has the potential for a significant positive
annual reoccurring financial impact, validated by ACOM IT staff to be $5.5 million. Some of these
expected savings from reducing use of vendors or maintaining multiple duplicative products be
offset against costs of development for ACOM’s IT Department. In addition, some cost savings may
not be available for capture and redirection, as some of this funding would be federal funds and
would be available for reinvestment in certain restricted program areas.
Change Management Plan: Depending on the applications identified for replacement, this
initiative will affect internal ACOM staff and external stakeholder groups. This will necessitate
comprehensive communication and training plans. ACOM has an opportunity to promote this
initiative as a “win” for the many stakeholders who engage with the department. Figure 26
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summarizes some of the key activities for communication plan; more detail is included in Appendix
A – ACOM Work Plan.
Figure 26 – ACOM-5 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
• ACOM is embarking on a project to
All Staff modernize its applications, with the goal to Staff emails Communication
improve efficiencies for staff and the Team
public.
• This investment will help ACOM better fulfill
its mission.
• [INSERT NAME] application will be retired
Impacted (provide timeframe). Staff emails Communication
Staff • A new application will be built with your Team
support and expertise.
• The expected features of this new system
include [insert].
• Training will be provided to support you in
this transition.
• ACOM is embarking on a project to
Public modernize its applications, with the goal to Social media, Communication
improve efficiencies for staff and the website, and press Team
public. releases, stakeholder
• This investment will help ACOM better fulfill emails, stakeholder
its mission. meetings (all
• The impacted applications include [insert]. channels).
• New features include [insert].
• Training resources will be available
including [insert].
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Customer Experience Initiatives
ACOM included two initiatives as part of its Arkansas Forward priorities that focus on improving
service delivery and program outcomes for Arkansans. A 2022 McKinsey & Company “State-of-the-
States” survey established a strong link between customer experience and resident satisfaction and
illustrated that customer experience improvements can have tremendous benefits for government
agencies and their staff and stakeholders (summarized in Figure 27).
Figure 27 – Benefits to State Agencies from Improving Customer Experience
Source: McKinsey & Company, 2022 State-of-the-States Survey.
Initiative ACOM #21 - Create standard processes to improve customer satisfaction
within defined business days in Commerce’s call centers in Re-employment
This initiative directs ACOM to create standardized procedures to improve customer satisfaction
within defined business days in Commerce call centers in Re-employment.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Within Workforce Connections, the Re-employment
Division (Re-employment) administers Arkansas’ unemployment benefits. Re-employment
maintains a mature contact center model that went live in February 2022, which is responsible for
answering calls from the public and employers. Re-employment’s team working the two main phone
queues includes 40 positions (with 11 vacancies). Additional staff respond to inquiries in other
phone queues including more advanced issues. This team includes bilingual staff in languages such
as Spanish and Marshallese.
ACOM uses multiple strategies to manage the quality of experience provided through this contact
center:
• Data-based monitoring: ACOM has established key metrics including average speed to
answer, average hold time, and first call resolution, among others, to monitor the caller’s
experience. Certain goals have been established (e.g., wait time not to exceed 20 minutes).
Existing reporting enables real-time monitoring by leadership at the call center level, as well
as by unit and agent.
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• Training: Staff receive training, including cross-training on other related operational team
functions such as claims and report processing. Once per month, staff receive ongoing
training delivered over Teams to address recurring themes and improve the quality of
responses provided. Staff also receive weekly emails including written analysis of trends and
issues (i.e., fraudulent claims, addressing incorrect information provided by staff). The team
has identified that while training is robust, it would support additional training.
• Resources for agents: To help agents provide correct information to callers, Re-employment
has invested in resources such as Teams chat to ask allow agents to ask questions of their
supervisor during a call and created searchable resources such as the policy manual and
lawbook which are accessible for use during calls.
• Quality Assurance (QA): Call monitoring is possible through the existing system which allows
for recordings. A process is used to review that the information was accurate, staff adhered
to policy, and displayed customer service best practices. There is not a formal scorecard in
use per employee, which could be done quarterly and used to drive training. Existing QA
activities are limited due to resource allocation issues (resources focused on other projects
such as the core system implementation).
• Addressing needs of non-English speaking callers: ACOM received a $4.6 million grant from
the Department of Labor to translate materials into multiple languages. ACOM has hired 6
bilingual Spanish agents and additional staff who speak Marshallese, Vietnamese, among
other languages.
ACOM is in the process of completing two major technology implementations which impact its
contact center operations.
• Core system modernization project: Re-employment is migrating from its mainframe to a
cloud-based system. This project is being built in-house by ACOM IT resources. This upgrade
will allow the technology workflow to more closely match the process used by staff. In
addition, shifting away from the existing system will allow Re-insurance to deploy additional
self-service functionality to the public through a secure portal. It is anticipated self-service
functionality will drive increased satisfaction and improve the customer experience.
• Telephony system upgrade: ACOM is the first department to migrate from its existing
Genesys telephony system (managed by MAXIMUS) to the Presidio product, which is
managed by Transformation and Shared Services (TSS) Department of Information Services
(DIS). This conversion should not impact the quality or types of reporting available to ACOM
and offers a significant cost savings to Arkansas (in reduced license fees).
An additional factor impacting the quality of the caller experience is the tenure of the workforce.
According to program leadership, knowledge of unemployment insurance is most critical in
providing accurate information and addressing the reason for the call. Most staff taking calls (about
62%) have less than one year of experience. In addition to the programmatic investments here, some
of the reorganization of this division and investment in the skills of the workforce by upgrading
positions and creating opportunities for promotion were designed to improve retention.
Rationale: ACOM selected this initiative to continue its ongoing efforts to improve the quality of and
satisfaction with its Re-employment contact center. There are opportunities to build additional
training (including customizing it to worker needs) and quality assurance resources, but these
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initiatives will be sequenced with completion of the system upgrade, as existing staff resources are
being utilized to support requirements gathering, testing, and other aspects of the upgrade.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan provides the action steps in
the recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with ACOM staff include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Measuring satisfaction can be challenging in Re-employment; callers may be upset and
dissatisfied as a result of their circumstances and not based on their interaction with ACOM
staff. Previously, metrics such as net promoter score were used by Re-employment but the
data collected reflected this challenge. Instead, Re-employment is focusing on a group of
metrics which are a proxy for customer experience (average speed to answer, hold time, first
call resolution). These metrics measure quality of their experience interacting with ACOM
staff. If a satisfaction survey is used, there will likely be a delay between the call and the
administration of the survey.
• Re-employment’s leadership team has adequate access to reporting (dashboards) with the
current telephony system; in the conversion to the Presidio product, monitor to ensure
continued access to needed reports.
• Support customer service focus of staff by using this initiative and the related KPIs as an
opportunity to have continued dialogue about the customers Re-employment services and
the importance of improvements in the customer experience. Once metrics are formalized,
leadership should model discussing performance and establishing corrective action plans
whenever performance falls below the goal (or target).
Recommended steps for continued improvement (future state):
• Review and formalize written methodology for key performance indicators, including to
establish a goal (target) for each, based on historical performance and building in a degree
of process improvement. Some of these targets may be modest improvements, while others
may include stretch goals. There are industry expectations for average speed to answer and
average hold time, which may also be taken into account. For example, typical speed to
answer in the private sector is approximately 30 seconds or less. ACOM is not staffed to meet
this standard but ACOM may establish a plan to reduce the average over time to be more in
line with industry expectations. Figure 28 shows some example metrics and industry
standards.
Figure 28 – Example Call Center Metrics for Consideration by ACOM
Measure Purpose Typical Standard
Average handle time Measures the length of a call from start to finish. Varies by industry
Average speed to Measures the average time it takes for a call to be 30-60 seconds
answer answered by a live agent.
Abandonment rate Measures the percentage of calls that disconnect <3-5%
before being answered.
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First call resolution Measures ability to resolve customer issues within the 70-85%, industry
first contact. leaders exceed 90%
Satisfaction Rate Measures customer experience and satisfaction with 90%
the call center (not department overall)
Source: Alex Doran, “12 Key Call Center Metrics & KPIs To Drive Better Performance,” 2/12/24,
https://www.nextiva.com/blog/call-center-metrics.html?v=2.
• Establish a method for collecting satisfaction data of callers (a survey to be conducted 3-4
days following the call, as was recommended by staff). Understanding that this metric may
not be a true reflection of the performance of the contact center, additional metrics should
be used in concert with this metric to assess overall performance (examples include first call
resolution, average speed to answer).
• Formalize reporting expectations on the KPIs to leadership (monthly dashboard or more
frequently if desired). Establish the expectation that when metrics are not met, corrective
actions are to be prepared.
• Provide training and support for Re-employment managers on using data (how to access and
analyze it, how to share with staff, levers to address under-performance).
• Formalize quality assurance protocol including sampling methodology (what percent of calls
to sample per worker and on what frequency) and a standard scorecard to use in scoring
individual calls (elements already in use include accuracy of information provided, customer
service/politeness, adherence to policy). Establish a quarterly process to aggregate scores
and feedback at the worker level, to be used by the manager in developing individualized
training. A barrier to this recommendation is available staffing.
• Once this scoring is available, consider employee and team recognition programs to build
morale through recognition of top performers. Recognition could include featuring these
staff in the staff newsletter or on monthly Teams training calls, hosting a quarterly breakfast
or lunch for top performers with leadership, or financial awards.
Along with these recommended steps, Re-employment should move forward with its reorganization
to strengthen the tenure and skillset of the contact center and continue with implementation of the
new systems. Both of these efforts are expected to elevate the quality of the contact center and the
overall customer experience.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: The contact center is an
efficient statewide solution to assist the individuals and employers seeking support from Re-
employment. ACOM is already devoting significant financial and staffing resources toward improving
the experience and satisfaction of these stakeholders, and Re-employment leadership is using a
variety of proven practices to improve quality as previously noted. Formalizing some of these
practices in the manner discussed in the recommendations is aligned with these practices. Long-
term, Re-employments commitment to developing self-service tools for its stakeholders will further
improve the customer experience and result in a positive operational impact from a shift in some
calls to self-service channels.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Based on ACOM’s initial sizing, it is
anticipated this initiative can be done within existing appropriations. Future technology
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improvements to enhance self-service may result in additional costs (outside the scope of this
initiative).
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: Process
changes are anticipated due to this initiative in several ways:
• By using dashboards to drive continuous quality improvement, projects or initiatives may be
implemented to address a performance issue which could change the workflow.
• System changes could result in the elimination of workarounds and inefficient process
steps.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The expectation of this initiative is that ACOM will be able to improve the quality of customer service
provided in the Re-employment call center through a variety of strategies. A series of industry
standard performance metrics are already in use and should continue to be used to monitor the
effectiveness of proposed enhancements, including:
• Average speed to answer (goal is to decrease this metric from 20 minutes)
• Average wait time (goal is to decrease this metric through training, staff development, and
increased staff tenure)
• Call time (goal is to increase the call length slightly by providing more complete information
to reduce the need for some future calls)
• First call resolution (goal is to increase this rate, result in reduced need for future calls)
• Average satisfaction rate (methodology pending; see above)
While most of these metrics are reported on today, formalizing the methodology and reporting
protocols will be important. In addition, to continue to advance process improvement, Re-
employment leadership should review baseline data to establish goals for each year and build-in
targeted performance improvement. For example, the average speed to answer is approximately 20
minutes today, which is longer than the industry average. It is a function of the complexity of the calls
and staffing level in existence today. The Re-employment team could create a multi-year plan to
reduce the time to 10 minutes, identifying the process changes and staffing it would require to reach
this goal. This is an example of how the metric could be used to drive improvement over time.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: This initiative is not anticipated to result in cost savings in the short-term (launch of
self-service functionality in the future will introduce operational and cost savings), but could result
in improved first-call resolution and decreased need for future calls, which could alleviate some
demand on call center agents.
Change Management Plan: Many of the changes discussed in this section are extensions of
strong practices already in flight as initiated by Re-employment leadership. Continuing to reinforce
ACOM’s commitment to customer service and supporting the increased data acumen of the Re-
employment contact center will be enabling practices for this initiative. Communication
recommendations are included in Attachment A – ACOM Work Plan and summarized in Figure 29.
Figure 29 – ACOM-21 Communication Plan
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Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Managers • Leadership are harnessing technology and • Town-hall style Kristen Rhodes,
and staff in using data analytics to improve the quality meetings with Contact center
Re- of experience for our clients (the public agency call leadership
employment and employers) center staff
contact • We will be implementing a series of • Staff newsletters
center improvements to the contact center to • Staff emails
elevate the experience [summarize final
recommendations adopted]
• ACOM is committed to ongoing training
and support for you to help you better
serve customers and improve customer
experience
• ACOM is committed to recognizing strong
performance [insert recognition program
details]
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Initiative ACOM #27 - Develop a performance framework that defines the customer
base and establishes and tracks success metrics
This initiative directs ACOM to develop a performance framework that defines the customer base,
establishes success metrics, and tracks and mitigates underperformance to those metrics within
ACOM.
Overview and Current State: This initiative was developed for inclusion in Arkansas Forward to
address one of the primary pain points for the organization: that few divisions have articulated their
strategies, goals, aspirations, and key performance indicators (KPIs).
Prior work has identified three key metrics as important overarching measures for the department,
to align with the vision of Governor Sarah Huckabee-Sanders:
• Real GDP Per Capita
• Labor Force Participation Rate
• Per Capita Income
These metrics align to ACOM’s mission to champion economic opportunities for the state. However,
use of data across divisions varies, access to management tools and dashboards varies, and there
is no department-wide performance framework for ACOM’s leadership to use in driving performance
improvement. Data acumen, definition of metrics, and existence of dashboards vary by division.
Rationale: ACOM-27 includes not only establishment of a performance framework for the
department, but also offers an opportunity for ACOM to engage its stakeholders by sharing data on
performance and develop its team by building a culture of continuous improvement. Creation of this
framework will help ACOM mature as a data-driven organization and realize a number of advantages
including:
• Bringing focus to a core group of measures that are the most important for each division and
the department overall;
• Driving performance improvement by identifying goals/targets for each measure and pushing
the department to continue to elevate performance; and,
• Providing real-time data to inform management decisions and monitor the department’s
progress in reaching the stated goals.
Implementation Considerations:
Other states have developed dashboards to communicate their key performance indicators to
external stakeholders. An example is highlighted in Figure 30.
Figure 30 – Other State Example: External Dashboard
State Description
Colorado As part of the Governor’s Dashboard, the goals and performance of each department
are provided each fiscal year. Color coding illustrates whether the department’s
performance meets or has not yet met each goal. Interactive charts allow the user to
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expand on each goal to see the major initiatives to improve performance in that goal.
For Insurance in the current 2023-2024 fiscal year, the goals include:
• Implement the Colorado Option – Ensure that 80% of Coloradans have access
to a Colorado Option plan that has met the 10% premium rate reduction target
or have access to a plan that has reduced health care provider rates down to
the maximum allowable under Colorado statute by June 30, 2024
• Access to Homeowners Insurance – Ensure 99% of Coloradan homeowners
have access to homeowners insurance by June 30, 2025
For labor and employment, the current goals include:
• Family and Medical Leave Insurance Program – Ensure 75% of eligible
claimants receive their FAMLI benefit payments within 10 calendar days by
June 30, 2024
• Energy and Infrastructure Jobs – Enroll 3,000 Coloradoans in training programs
that prepare them for careers in energy and infrastructure-related fields,
enabled by new federal funding, by June 30, 2024
• Youth Labor Force Participation – Increase the employment to population ratio
for youth ages 16-24 from 57.2% to 60.0% by June 30, 2024
Resources:
https://dashboard.colorado.gov/governors-dashboard/labor-employment
https://dashboard.colorado.gov/governors-dashboard/insurance
To create a detailed plan for ACOM’s implementation of this initiative, a work session was held with
a combination of subject matter experts, led by the initiative owner (ACOM’s CFO), in July 2024. This
session was conducted using the Lean Six Sigma methodology by facilitator with a Six Sigma Black
Belt. The session included Finance and Procurement leadership and staff who are closest to the
work, who are best qualified to identify implementation hurdles and to ideate ways to overcome,
mitigate, or work around those obstacles. The outputs of these sessions are:
• Interference Diagram: diagrammed the goal of establishing a performance framework and
identified with key staff the obstacles/pain points of establishing that framework. Then,
ideated ways of overcoming those obstacles.
• Strategic Path: used sufficiency-based logic and the ideas from the interference diagram to
fill in the sub-steps for each action item in building the performance framework. The path in
this case uses specific metrics-focused experience with public sector agencies to enable
Commerce to build a performance framework that demands ambitious but achievable
results from Departments and tracks metrics that focus on key Balanced Scorecard and
Baldridge methodology measurements
Typically, when process mapping is used, there is a “current state” for a given process that needs to
be morphed into a desired “future state.” However, when there is no “current state” (such as
contemplated here, where a new performance framework is implemented), the effort is different. In
this case, identification of the major obstacles is a primary focus of the planning effort. It is critical
to work with staff closest to the work to identify obstacles that need to be overcome to implement
the project. These staff are best qualified to identify these hurdles and to ideate ways to overcome,
mitigate, or work around those obstacles.
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ACOM staff identified barriers and risks to implementing a performance framework (the goal, as
shown in blue box), which are shown in Figure 31 (red boxes). Some of these concerns include:
• Developing consensus around key measures;
• Complexity of data access and aggregation into a dashboard;
• Lack of access to data visualization tools;
• Data integrity issues; and,
• Constraints around data analysis resources.
Figure 31 – Interference Diagram for Developing Performance Framework
Source: Source: Prepared in work session with ACOM staff in July 2024.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Collaboration with other departments who have undergone this exercise would be helpful in
sharing of best practices. For example, Arkansas Department of Agriculture (ADA) has
identified creation of internal and external dashboards among the highest priorities for the
department. Under the leadership of the Information Technology Team, the first generation
of internal management dashboards has been deployed for Plant Industries and is in process
for the Poultry and Livestock and Natural Resources divisions. The department is building
these dashboards with existing IT resources and deploying them through a web-based
application. Implementation is planned in phases; each department is establishing an initial
dashboard with available data. Staff manually collect and input metrics. Staff receive
training on how to add additional metrics. The second phase of the project will be to
automate dashboard production to reduce recurring staff data collection and reporting time.
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In the third phase, division leaders will receive training in data visualization tools. It is
anticipated that as the department’s data acumen increases, leaders will adjust the metrics
on their internal dashboards, focusing the number of measures and identifying gaps in data
not captured.
• Capturing stakeholder input to inform the selection of KPIs and how to measure success was
identified as a solution to several of the potential barriers to success. This also promotes
transparency. ACOM has many diverse stakeholders, but conducting some public meetings
to discuss the department’s plans and obtain feedback would be helpful as this initiative
progresses. Existing advisory committees and feedback channels should be used where
possible.
• Identifying resources to support data validation, measure definition, dashboard creation,
and data analysis will be important.
• To address data security issues, ACOM should consider strict data governance policies and
conduct regular audits to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the data being reported.
• To fully realize the operational benefits of becoming a more data-driven organization,
building data analytics acumen is an important enabling practice. Having staff with the
experience to support leadership in establishing performance expectations tied to the
metrics, modeling behaviors for use of the dashboards, and establishing accountability for
performance of the metrics is important. This includes assigning owners to each metric,
setting a goal/standard for each metric based on statute/industry best practice/historical
performance, reviewing dashboards regularly in meetings and requiring owners of areas with
under- performance to develop and execute remediation plans.
• It is recommended that ACOM and management commit to the multi-year journey required
to develop and refine a performance framework. In the short-term, not all the data the
department desires to include may be available. Some data may be available but lack a
sufficient baseline period. Once operational, managers may find that data they need are not
included or that some measures they thought would be helpful are not. The framework
should evolve as needed to support ongoing process improvement.
Recommended steps for establishing internal and external dashboards (future state):
• A core project team with IT and programmatic leadership should be formed to support the
project’s implementation.
• Implementation can occur in a phased approach by division. Conduct a workshop with each
division to discuss how to measure success and identify KPIs that are relevant and
meaningful to their work. The Division of Workforce Services’ existing dashboard could be
included as an example for these divisions.
• Conduct stakeholder feedback sessions to gather input on these metrics and any additional
ideas for inclusion.
• Establish a standardized metric definition process to ensure consistency across divisions.
Define any new staff roles that may be required to perform this function.
o The output of this work should be a list of metrics and key fields of information (see
Appendix B provides a worksheet that may be used by staff in identifying and defining
potential metrics). Each division should consider multiple metric types. While
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available data may be more “output”-focused (transactional, volume-based), effort
should be taken to identify other types of measures such as:
Efficiency: This measure type captures the effectiveness and efficiency of
internal processes. Examples include average time to complete an activity (i.e.,
complete an investigation) or average cost per key activity. This type of metric is
applicable to any core task with a statutory timeline, where is focused on meeting
a specific timeframe, as well as any area where the department wants to
establish additional transparency or thinks there is an opportunity to achieve
improvement through regular review of data.
Outcome: Outcome measures focus on the results of ACOM’s processes for
stakeholders including industry stakeholders and Arkansans and may be longer-
term. Examples may include the number of business relocations to Arkansas and
the number of jobs created by sector.
• Develop the proposed set of metrics.
o Define thresholds for “success” and “quality” (with recommended targets).
o Map the necessary data for metrics to the system storing the data and data fields.
o Develop priority list for building dashboards.
• Collaborate with IT resources to design and develop a centralized dashboard concept that
can integrate and display data from various divisions, in real-time.
o Include an initial set of metrics per division as well as a higher-level holistic ACOM
dashboard.
o Include proposed goals or standards per metric (could be statutory, based on history, or
based on industry).
o Include proposed owners of metrics.
o Identify whether all metrics can be automated, or if automation will be phased with some
initial manual data entry.
o Determine whether ACOM will invest in data visualization tools or use an approach
similar to ADA (free, web-based tool).
o Develop schedule for dashboard production (time period for data pull if automated and
any manual entry if applicable). Note that there may be automated data points that can
be updated in real-time, as well as other metrics that are available monthly.
• Present plan to Secretary McDonald for approval.
o Identify candidates for the pilot phase (divisions).
o Define the pilot plan: duration, scope, divisions.
o Begin measuring and reporting for the pilot period.
• Implement a pilot with select divisions to test the functionality of the dashboard.
• Collect feedback from pilot participants to identify and resolve technical issues or user-
interface improvements needed before wider rollout. Incorporate any material/manuals
from a vendor if appropriate.
• Once the dashboard has been established, ACOM leadership should sign off on:
o Assignment of each metric to an owner. This person is responsible for ensuring the data
are updated as well as owns the performance (owns corrective action if not met).
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o Establishment of policy/procedure for responsibilities of a metric owner (when
dashboard must be updated each month if not automated, what to do if metrics are not
met)
o A recurring schedule for review of dashboards among leadership (such as by building into
existing leadership meetings on a monthly basis).
• Organize comprehensive training sessions for all division managers and relevant staff on
how to use the new reporting platform effectively:
o Deliver training with schedule for ongoing training opportunities;
o Establish communication plan for rollout timing and methodology;
o Ensure system access to dashboards for staff;
o Begin live-links and publishing of data in the dashboard, with data review process;
• The core project team should provide continuous support for the implementation of the
dashboard, and complete the following:
o Review data integrity issues (bad data appearing on dashboard).
o Complete a return on investment analysis following completion of the project.
o ACOM leadership should establish a schedule for reviewing performance goals to
continue to drive quality improvement and the functionality of the dashboard (to make
changes to metrics included and methodology). The timing of this process should occur
at least annually and can be built into annual strategic planning and budgeting
conversations to inform appropriations requests.
• If any data is intended for external release, the core project team should develop an external
communication plan (press release, user guide and frequently asked questions for the
website, and stakeholder emails).
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Based on interviews with
ACOM leadership, ACOM has the staffing and resources to support this initiative including within the
divisions and among its technical staff. Existing resources in each division support data collection
and reporting today and this initiative is expected to result in use of automated dashboards, reducing
time spent on data collection and preparation of manual reports.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: Based on ACOM’s initial sizing of
costs of implementing a new dashboard, it is anticipated this initiative can be done within existing
appropriations. Further, ACOM can implement this dashboard in a phased-approach, to further
reduce costs (i.e., start with simple Excel-based monthly report with no data visualization). There are
no staffing costs expected as a result of this initiative, as long as ACOM’s IT, reporting, and data
analytics staff can devote time to this project. No IT costs are expected, unless Commerce chooses
to invest in any specific analytics software. ADA offers an example of a no-cost web-based tool for
consideration by ACOM.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: The
most significant anticipated process change is that establishment of a performance framework and
related dashboard will support ACOM in becoming a more data-driven organization. In order for the
dashboards to have the intended impact of supporting each division in setting performance goals
and holding business units accountable for performance, integrating the use of the dashboards into
decision-making will take time and require modeling from ACOM’s leadership team. Some of the
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
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ways to support this change include to regularly incorporate review of the dashboard on department,
division, and team meetings; on a monthly basis, require metric owners with performance below the
goal to provide a remediation plan; hold lunch and learns to allow peers to share best practices in
how they are using the dashboard to identify and address problems in their business units; and
provide tip sheets on how managers can integrate review of the dashboard into their own team
meetings.
Another set of process changes may occur due to the lack of data availability. ACOM may not
currently capture all data it wishes to include in its internal or external dashboards. For example, a
division may wish to set standards to complete certain transactional tasks within a given timeframe
but the current process may not involve tracking key dates or times for every step in the process. If
the division wishes to include these measures, it will have to adjust the current business process to
capture and store this data for reporting purposes.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The success of this
initiative will be measured by the existence of real-time dashboard (by division) and evidence of the
dashboard’s use by the management team. Metrics to track this include:
• Dashboard utilization (e.g., unique weekly views);
• Post-development survey of dashboard user satisfaction; and,
• Number/percent of managerial meetings into which regular dashboard review to support
decision processes is incorporated
These metrics are new to the organization to capture and would require definition, documentation
of the data source/methodology, and establishment of a baseline.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: Based on ACOM’s analysis, ACOM-27 is expected to have a fiscally neutral impact.
In the short term, staff will be collecting and reporting on the dashboard metrics manually. If the IT
team can automate the dashboard, this will result in freed-up time for staff otherwise responsible
for data collection and reporting, which can be reinvested into other areas of responsibility.
Operational savings from performance improvement could be realized in the future.
Change Management Plan: Recommended messaging and modalities are included for each
audience in Figure 32. Key activities and timing for communication plan are included in Appendix A
– ACOM Work Plan.
Figure 32 – ACOM-27 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Prior to metric development: • Press • Tammy Williams
External stakeholders • ACOM is developing an exciting release (Project Lead)
dashboard to share data with • Website • Communication Lead
the public. update
• The dashboards will help ACOM • Emails
become a more data-driven distributed
via existing
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
66
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
organization and drive a culture stakeholder
of improvement. lists
• Public meetings are going to be
held [INSERT detail].
Once metrics are developed:
• Process overview of the
categories of metrics available,
how the metrics were chosen
and how ACOM developed the
dashboards.
• ACOM is developing a • Townhall • Secretary Hugh
ACOM management performance framework and meetings. McDonald
staff dashboard to align all staff • Management • Division leaders
around the department’s core staff emails. • Communication Lead
goals and to help the
department before more data
driven.
• These tools are meant to help
managers have access to real-
time information about their
staff’s performance.
• Resources will be provided to
support their adoption of these
tools including training, lunch
and learns, and FAQs.
• Explain the categories of
metrics available, how the
metrics were chosen, and how
ACOM developed the
dashboard.
• Ask for their support in
monitoring the impact of the
dashboard and identifying areas
for improvement in future
iterations.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
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Statewide Grant Oversight and Administration Initiatives
Two initiatives identified by the Arkansas Forward Steering Committee as priorities for the State of
Arkansas relate grant administration. Today, grant management and oversight are decentralized
functions across state government. The intent of these initiatives is to ensure planning occurs at the
statewide level in terms of where to locate key federal grants and to allow for sharing of best
practices in grant oversight and management activities. In addition, there is no single entity focused
on monitoring federal funding opportunities and strengthening the quality of the state’s application
for competitive funds. ACOM has been identified as the possible department for centralization and
the entity charged with driving the analysis to inform decision-making about centralization of grants,
as well as leveraging the experience of its existing team, which is well-versed in federal grant
application and management, to serve as a center of excellence for grant monitoring and grant
writing activities.
Initiative ACOM #38 - Assess potential for centralizing grants to improve compliance
and increase efficiency
The purpose of this initiative is to investigate which grants across departments can be centralized
vs. which grants should remain distributed within departments and coordinate migration if
recommended to increase efficiency and reduce duplicative efforts over the next year.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Today, grant application and management is
decentralized across state government, with multiple Arkansas departments having expertise in
relevant federal programs for their subject area. The Department of Finance and Administration
(DFA) does maintain an Intergovernmental Services Team, State Grant Programs unit, which is
responsible for completing Arkansas’ cost allocation plan and serving as the state clearinghouse for
federal grants. This unit is not responsible for looking for additional funding opportunities or
identifying funds maximization strategies for the State, which represents an opportunity (see ACOM-
46).
Individual Arkansas departments independently oversee the distribution of funding and monitor
performance of grantees, given that they have subject matter expertise and historical knowledge of
the funding and impacted programs. However, oversight of these grants varies by department.
Differences in monitoring processes, tools, and staff training and experience create inefficiencies
and variances in outcomes.
The Department of Inspector General (DIG) Office of Internal Audit has statutory responsibility for
conducting oversight of state programs, including evaluating how grant funds are used, but has
limited bandwidth today to perform these audits. DIG has identified the opportunity to conduct
greater data-based monitoring of the many grant recipients in Arkansas as an untapped area of
oversight and one they could address through DIG-2, an Arkansas Forward initiative related to using
data-based monitoring.
Rationale: Centralization of the grant function can help the State of Arkansas conduct planning at
the statewide level in terms of where to house certain grants (e.g., the Community Development
Block Grant at ACOM, Medicaid funding at the Department of Human Services). In addition,
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Arkansas can achieve improved outcomes by establishing a central team to disseminate best
practices in terms of grant monitoring and oversight, improve consistency in process, and support
the many departments relying on federal grant funding in their operations.
There may also be benefits to community partners and stakeholders, should streamlining of the
grant distribution processes occur. Some other states have adopted a centralized approach to
overseeing and managing grants and have achieved these efficiencies in oversight (auditing,
reporting, assessing outcomes) and simplified the process for entities who receive grant funding that
is distributed by states.
• Massachusetts: Three state agencies launched "OneStop," a common single online
application for entities applying for state funds. This effort included the Executive Office of
Housing and Economic Development (EOHED), the Department of Housing and Community
Development (DHCD), and MassDevelopment.8
• Nevada: The state has an Office of Federal Assistance, within the Office of the Governor. The
Legislature directed the Office to develop a grant management system (Assembly Bill 445)
and provided funding, with the intent to streamline the process for awardees. 9 The Office
conducted a needs assessment in Spring 2022 with support from an external consultant
(TriMetrix consulting services) and moved forward with its procurement thereafter.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan provides the action steps in
the recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with DFA and ACOM staff
and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Centralization may not be appropriate for all grants. The workgroup for ACOM-38 (“the
Team”) should establish criteria and conduct analysis in partnership with affected
departments to identify which grants should be centralized, where they should be
centralized, and what duties should remain with impacted departments. DHS, in particular,
maintains responsibility for developing various federal plans including the state’s Medicaid
plan and Title IV-E cost allocation plan among others, and the Team should collaborate with
DHS to determine how the centralization effort will impact DHS.
• Close collaboration between the centralized team and other Arkansas departments will be
needed for success. The departments have significant knowledge of federal funding streams
and historical programs, as well as relationship with grantees.
• Once decisions are made in terms of where to house certain grants, analysis of the potential
workload impact will need to occur and additional staff from other departments may need to
be transferred to that central entity.
• Develop an implementation plan for any staffing consolidation.
8
Route Fifty, “One state’s grant management breakthrough,” March 14, 2023, https://www.route-
fifty.com/infrastructure/2023/03/one-states-grant-management-breakthrough/384046/.
9
Office of Federal Assistance, “Grant Management System,” https://ofa.nv.gov/GMS/Grant-Management-
System/.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
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Recommended steps to implement grant centralization (future state):
• Conduct a data request for each department (collect data on grant administration by
department, federal agencies they interact with, whether opportunities are competitive or
non-competitive).
• Identify criteria to be used in determining which grants should be centralized vs. retained at
departments.
• Complete an assessment of which grants should be centralized and make
recommendations about where they should be centralized.
• Present to Office of the Governor for approval.
• Develop a communication plan to engage impacted departments.
• Establish survey and feedback mechanisms to monitor centralization process and ensure a
“customer focus” in meeting the needs of the Team’s fellow cabinet-level departments.
Recommended steps to implement grant oversight (future state):
• Identify the number of staff resources a centralized grant team requires to oversee the
intended grants using the intended process steps.
• Form a workgroup in the development of best practices for grant oversight. Departments
could provide a list of their most seasoned grant-related resources to serve on this group.
• Conduct process mapping with a sample of large departments on their grant oversight
processes.
o Conduct process mapping at AEDC and at other departments for existing grant
monitoring. Review with advisory team to add additional best practices used in other
departments.
o Based on this process mapping, identify which oversight steps should remain the
responsibility of departments vs. the centralized group.
• Identify whether any cabinet-level department has a technology solution that can support
this function or requires a new tool.
• Meet with DIG to discuss how its auditors can assist in grant audit and oversight activities.
• Develop a toolkit for departments on best practices in grant oversight.
• Develop training materials on grant oversight for other state departments.
• Launch training program.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Multiple departments
including ACOM, ADH, DHS, and others have significant expertise in grant administration, and this
initiative leverages this experience for the benefit of the state. However, this initiative may need to
be sequenced with the organization work that is of higher priority to ACOM.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: There are currently no dedicated
staff in Arkansas state government dedicated to a centralized grant administration and oversight
process. This initiative uses existing resources within AEDC to build a team, but the team may require
additional resources. It is anticipated these resources could be transferred from other departments,
for a net neutral fiscal impact to the state. If the team requires additional grant administration
software, this could be an additional expense.
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Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: The
Team will need to establish central policies and procedures for grant management and oversight,
not only within the division but on behalf of the state. It is anticipated forming of a workgroup of staff
from across departments will allow for sharing of best practices, which may elevate the processes
used by all departments.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The intent of this initiative
is to improve outcomes related to the grants received by Arkansas, by improving the quality of the
monitoring. Expected outcomes include to reduce time spent on redundant grant management
work, increase grant compliance, reduce grant processing time. Creating a centralized process will
allow for more uniform data collection and the creation of new performance measures which are
difficult to compare across departments today with the de-centralized process. Such metrics could
include:
• Grant processing time
• Percent of grants with outcome data collected
• Percent of grants audited
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: This initiative is not anticipated to result in a cost savings.
Change Management Plan: There is executive-level agreement between DFA and ACOM to house
this function at ACOM. However, building buy-in from other departments will require collaboration
and engagement. Because grants have been managed by individual departments, there may be
resistance to centralization. It is important for ACOM to involve stakeholders in the planning process,
communicate the benefits clearly, and provide excellent customer service to customer service to
affected departments during and after the transition. These tasks are included in Attachment A –
ACOM Work Plan and summarized in Figure 33 below.
Figure 33 – ACOM-38 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
Impacted ● Grant management and ● Initial discussion ● Allison
departments oversight is being centralized. with Governor’s Hatfield, Chief
● A centralized group elevates Office of Staff
the rigor of these activities ● Email to ● Hugh
state-wide. department McDonald,
● The Team will be building tools Secretaries and Secretary of
and training to support Chiefs of Staff Commerce
department grant monitoring ● Meetings with
efforts. impacted
● The Team asks for cooperation departments
in upcoming data request and
collaboration during the
implementation of this initiative
in sharing of best practices to
help the department collect
these practices to share
statewide.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
71
Initiative ACOM #46 - Create a grant writing center of excellence
This initiative focuses on creation of a grant writing center of excellence that supports departments
in tracking federal funding opportunities, winning competitive grant awards, and reducing the burden
of General Revenues in funding state expenditures. This initiative differs from the previous initiative
in that its focus is helping Arkansas to maximize federal funds and gain efficiencies in seeking out
grants, as opposed to the distribution and oversight processes.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The federal government distributes substantial federal
grants to states for a variety of purposes, summarized in Figure 34.
Figure 34 – Federal Grants by Funding Type, 2021 and 2023
Source: USA Facts, “Which States Rely the Most on Federal Aid,” Updated August 1, 2024,
https://usafacts.org/articles/which-states-rely-the-most-on-federal-aid/.
States differ to the extent that they pursue competitive federal funding and the skill and resources
they expend in this effort. No single entity in Arkansas today is focused on ensuring the state
maximizes its federal funding to ensure the most appropriate use not only of general revenue funds,
but also other federal funding streams (e.g., TANF).
States with the largest federal funding per capita are shown in Figure 35, with Arkansas provided for
context. Arkansas falls within the top half of states by this measure (ranked 19th), which is impacted
by Arkansas’ decision to accept Medicaid Expansion through ARHome. However, this may partially
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
72
obscure the impact of other missed federal funding opportunities (i.e., some of the child welfare
funding opportunities identified in DHS-6).
Figure 35 – Average Federal Funding Per Capita, FY 2021
State Average Federal Funding Per Capita
Alaska $8,628
Rhode Island $6,821
New Mexico $6,748
Wyoming $6,718
Delaware $6,011
Arkansas $4,188
Source: USA Facts.
Nationally, state pursuit of federal funding has tended be a de-centralized function. At the time of
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA)’s passage and the significant funding
opportunities available to states, more attention to differences in how states handled federal funds
maximization began to emerge. In 2009, National Association of State Auditors Comptrollers &
Treasurers sponsored a study of state comptrollers and found: 10
• In 95% of states, individual agencies pursue opportunities for federal grants;
• Central grant application support is not available in 91% of states;
• State financial leaders (comptrollers) did not have visibility to the number of grants
submitted or awarded in their state (76% and 84%, respectively).
In Arkansas, pursuit of grant funding has been a decentralized responsibility, with multiple
departments handling not only the application for but distribution of federal funds (Department of
Commerce, Department of Human Services, and Department of Education as examples). Concerns
have been identified not only at ACOM but across state government that Arkansas is leaving federal
funding on the table.
Rationale: There is no single entity in Arkansas state government charged with proactive monitoring
of federal funding opportunities, informing departments about potential policy changes at the
federal level that could have funding implications, and forming a strategy to maximize federal funds.
ACOM-46 seeks to address this gap.
When surveyed in 2009, 82% of comptrollers thought grant centralization was of “significant or
moderate value,” including in the following areas: 11
• Standardization
• Accountability
• Enhancing training and skills
10
National Association of State Auditors Comptrollers & Treasurers, State Comptrollers Survey 2009 Findings
and Conclusions, Are States Ready to Manage Federal Grant Funds?”
https://www.nasact.org/files/News_and_Publications/White_Papers_Reports/2010_01_04_NASACT_Accent
ure_Grants_Management.pdf
11
National Association of State Auditors Comptrollers & Treasurers, 2009.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
73
• Expanding source of software
• Enhancing information management
• Focus on outcomes
A few examples of states that have adopted a centralized approach to identifying and pursuing
federal funding include:
• Nevada, Office of Federal Assistance: Nevada has an Office of Federal Assistance,
attached to the Governor's Office, which was established in 2022 to address the state's low
per capita level of federal grant funding. "The Office of Federal Assistance (OFA)’s mission is
to increase the number of grant dollars Nevada receives by reducing/removing barriers to
federal funding and supporting grant applicants through resources, advocacy, and
coordination.” 12
• Oklahoma, Office of Management and Enterprise, Grants Management Office: The GMO
is the central administering entity for the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) for the State
of Oklahoma." 13
• Arizona Governor’s Office of Strategic Planning & Budgeting, Grants & Federal
Resources Team: One of the core duties of this team is that it "assists agencies in the
preparation of their budgets and provides support in identifying and
managing grant opportunities to optimize available funding." The team has created
resources for state agencies to use in determining whether to pursue
federal grant opportunities. 14
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – ACOM Work Plan provides the action steps in
the recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with DFA and ACOM staff
and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• The Team may consider purchase of new tools to support tracking and early indication of
federal funding opportunities. While staff at each department has expertise in monitoring
funding through the federal agencies they typically engage, no single entity in Arkansas state
government has been entrusted in monitoring across all federal opportunities. There are
policy development tools that provide alerts to the issuance of federal rules, which can be
an early indication of funding availability. There are subscription tools across functional
areas such as “Open Minds,” which can be used to track federal health and human services
opportunities. 15 Open Minds is a firm that also offers access to consultants to support state
12
Nevada Governor’s Office of Federal Assistance, https://ofa.nv.gov/.
13
Oklahoma Grant Management Office, https://oklahoma.gov/omes/divisions/grants-management-
office.html.
14
Governor’s Office of Strategic Planning and Budgeting, Grants & Federal Resources Team, “Grants Office
Documents,” https://grants.az.gov/grants-and-ecivis-resources/grants-office-documents.
15
Open Minds, https://openminds.com/.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
74
response federal funding opportunities. A variety of no and low-cost resources also exist
including the tracking tool offered by U.S. Digital Response. 16
Recommended steps to implement enhanced grant maximization efforts (future state):
• Identify tracking/subscription tools and a process to support monitoring of federal grant
opportunities across disciplines and federal departments. Establish policy and procedure
and assign staff to this purpose.
• Establish an ongoing communication process to share opportunities with cabinet-level
departments.
• Produce an annual report documenting efforts to maximize federal funds and results of these
efforts.
• Form a workgroup to advise in the development of best practices for grant writing.
Departments could provide a list of their most seasoned grant-related resources to serve on
this group.
• Develop a toolkit for departments on best practices in grant writing/competitive grant
pursuit.
• Develop training materials on grant oversight for other state departments.
• Launch training program.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative builds on the
Team’s expertise to improve the statewide pursuit of competitive grant opportunities and to
maximize federal funds. Housing this function centrally will help the state realize the benefits of
enhanced federal funds. However, this initiative may need to be sequenced with the organization
work that is of higher priority to ACOM.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: This initiative would require the
Team to build a new team to oversee both this and ACOM-38. This will require an initial investment.
Existing resources within various departments will build the team, but the team will require
additional resources. It is anticipated these resources could be transferred from other the staff who
support grants at departments, for a net neutral fiscal impact to the state. If the team requires
tracking tools to monitor federal funds, this could result in a cost, but prior to engaging in this
expense, the team should assess whether other departments are already subscribing to such
services to leverage their access and consider low or no-cost options.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: The
intent of this initiative is to develop a best practice toolkit on best practices in the pursuit of grants
and competitive federal awards. In consulting staff who perform this work across other
departments, a set of best practices will be identified and shared, which may result in process
changes not only at ACOM but at other departments that pursue federal awards.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The expectation of this initiative is that a centralized group will be able to use the center of excellence
to monitor funding opportunities, develop strategies to enhance Arkansas’ federal fund
16
U.S. Digital Response, https://www.usdigitalresponse.org/how-we-work.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
75
maximization, and elevate the quality of the state’s competitive grant applications. Proposed
process metrics to track the effectiveness of these efforts include:
• Number of grants applied for in federal fiscal year
• Percent of competitive grant applications won in federal fiscal year (expected to increase)
• Federal funding per capita (expected to increase)
• Total federal funding awarded in federal fiscal year
• Impact on General Revenue needs (% change in general revenue required due to increased
federal funds)
Because these are new metrics to report on, establishment of the methodology, data sources,
validation of the data, and creation of a baseline will be required before they can be utilized. The
need to collect this data across departments may necessitate implementation of grants tracking and
management software.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize once
implemented: This initiative is expected to result in positive fiscal impact of $5.0 million per year,
however this impact may be realized within the budgets of multiple departments.
Change Management Plan: Communication to all departments about the new resources
available through the Team will be an important part of implementation. Suggested communication
tasks are included in Attachment A – ACOM Work Plan and summarized in Figure 36.
Figure 36 – ACOM-46 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
● Accountability for increasing ● Email to Chiefs of
All Departments Arkansas’ share of federal Staff ● Allison
funding and maximizing federal Hatfield, Chief
opportunities is being ● Meetings with of Staff
centralized. impacted
departments ● Hugh
● Building a center of excellence McDonald,
will support departments in Secretary of
their pursuit of competitive Commerce
federal grants.
● A toolkit and training will be
available for your teams to help
to elevate the quality of grant
applications.
● The Team asks for collaboration
during the implementation of
this initiative in sharing of best
practices to help the
department collect these
practices to share statewide.
ACOM Strategic Management Plan Final 10/10/2024
76
Strategic Management Plan:
Arkansas Department of Health
Table of Contents
Overview ............................................................................................................................... 1
Recommended Organizational Structure ........................................................................... 2
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation ...................................... 4
ADH-01: Update Staff Action Summary (SAS) review system ............................................................... 4
ADH-04: Update Billing System ............................................................................................................. 11
ADH-05: Electronic Health Record (EHR) ............................................................................................. 18
ADH-08: Improve customer experience at local health units ............................................................. 23
ADH-09: Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and efficiency ........................... 30
ADH-12: Implement cross-training to enhance task coverage and knowledge continuity ............... 33
Overview
The Arkansas Department of Health's (ADH) mission is to protect and improve the health and well-
being of all Arkansans. ADH plays a vital role in the health and safety of Arkansas communities,
whether it is serving as a provider of critical health services in rural counties, administering vital
programs such as Women, Infants and Children (WIC) benefits, or utilizing ADH access to data and
surveillance to drive the state’s strategic response to public health crises, ADH seeks to achieve
optimal health for all Arkansans to maximize their personal, economic, and social impact.
The department has identified areas of focus for its 2024-2029 Strategic Plan, prioritizing prevention
and response to these public health challenges as critical in promoting the overall well-being of
Arkansans:
• Diabetes
• Heart Disease
• Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STDs)
• Women’s and maternal health
• Tobacco
Through the Arkansas Forward project, a 2024 effort to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of
Arkansas’ 15 cabinet-level departments, ADH is prioritizing the implementation of initiatives that will
best position it to deliver on its mission and address its strategic areas of focus, including two that
1
ADH Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
are related to its workforce, three related to improving operational processes, and one to improve
customer experience in local public health offices.
This Strategic Management Plan (“Plan”) memorializes the work completed by ADH during Arkansas
Forward, translating the department’s vision into a plan consisting of recommended organizational
structure, key initiatives prioritized for immediate implementation, and related performance metrics.
A companion project plan (“Work Plan”) provides a more detailed resource to support the
implementation of the initiatives by ADH’s Arkansas Forward project management team.
Recommended Organizational Structure
ADH’s current organization chart is shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1 – Current Organizational Structure
As part of Arkansas Forward, ADH’s structure was reviewed to identify opportunities for redesign in
three areas:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission;
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives; and,
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions (e.g.,
information technology, human resources, procurement).
As part of Arkansas Forward, ADH reviewed each of its five programmatic divisions: Division of Health
Advancement, Division of Health Protection; Division of Local Public Health, Division of Health Data
and Analytics; and the Public Health Laboratory. This review included discussion with leaders to
identify opportunities to create a more agile organization, considering span of control, number of
managerial layers, opportunities for internal shared services consolidation, and repurposing of
2
ADH Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
existing positions, among other factors. The needs of each division were considered, based on the
specialized mission of the organization and a variety of statutory and external constraints including:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission: No areas were
identified.
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives: Creation of
job families for subject matter experts would be beneficial for ADH, given the number of
senior technical staff across the organization (e.g.., epidemiologists).
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions:
Based on direction from the Steering Committee, Transformation and Shared Services (TSS)
will assume responsibility for the Payroll and Help Desk functions statewide as the first
Human Resources and Information Technology functions to transfer to TSS in a statewide
shared services model. Additional decisions on the sequencing of further functions have not
yet been determined.
Recommendations for ADH’s future state organization are to continue to operate the existing
organization structure, while taking the following actions:
• Continue to have discussions with senior leadership about the principles of an agile
organization to reinforce the expectation that they are responsible for identifying efficiencies,
unnecessary layers, span of control issues, and other improvements within their
organization;
• Encourage each leader to look within their organization for opportunities to flatten
managerial layers;
• Direct each leader to review the necessity of positions upon becoming vacant and use those
opportunities to make the organization more efficient with less abrasion;
• Create forums for leaders who have transformed their organization’s structure to share best
practices with colleagues to encourage similar actions across the organization; and,
• Create dotted-line reporting relationships where all staff for a functional area have not been
consolidated into a shared services team to realize benefits from greater collaboration. While
ADH has a mature shared services model where most staff have been centralized in key
functional areas such as IT, legal, human resources, and finance, there are a limited number
of instances in which consolidation has not occurred for business reasons (such as within IT,
where most staff report to the Chief Information Officer but there is a small team within the
Public Health Laboratory to maintain their applications). In these instances, stronger
relationships to the centralized function would be advantageous.
How this Department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective future
department
ADH prioritized implementation of six Arkansas Forward initiatives including two that are related to
its workforce, three related to improving operational processes, and one related to improving
customer experience in local public health offices. Taken together these initiatives seek to improve
the effectiveness and efficiency of the department and to improve staff and customer experience.
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Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward
Implementation
ADH leadership generated 18 ideas to improve the departmental effectiveness and efficiency, before
prioritizing 6 initiatives for immediate implementation as part of Arkansas Forward which collectively
focus on improving the organization.
ADH-01: Update Staff Action Summary (SAS) review system
This initiative upgrades the Staff Action Summary (SAS) review system to streamline process,
improve guidance clarity, digitize systems, provide training, and decrease administrative burden on
reviewers.
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADH is a unified health department, with a central
office coordinating among 92 local health units, five programmatic divisions, and shared services
functions. Given the size and complexity of the department, ADH developed the SAS process to
escalate items for decision, ensure decision accountability, and route documents through the
organization for approval. Over time, the reach of the SAS process has grown in both the number of
items subject to the SAS process and the number of approvers1 who are required to approve a
document. The situation has reached the point where staff have begun to believe that all documents
should be put through the process (a “SAS everything” viewpoint), regardless of whether the decision
or document warrants an approval process. Through interviews and a process mapping session with
department staff, several reasons for the growth in the over-use of the SAS process and the growing
list of approvers were identified, including:
• Staff use the SAS process to inform or consult other departments, divisions, and units. These
staff may have had already had input into the document or may just need to be made aware
of the content of the document but do not need to actually “approve” it.
• Decision-making authority is not “right-sized.” Many of the approvers do not necessarily need
to approve the document, but they may need to be informed or consulted. Decisions are not
empowered at the right level within the organization.
• The SAS process introduces inefficiencies in decision-making by creating additional layers of
approval that are not needed. Depending on the document type, the number of approvers
ranges from 8 to as many as 18 people who must review and initial/sign the document. Each
person in the routing process takes additional staff time.
• A culture of “risk-aversion” leads to having 8-18 approvers on a document so that
accountability for the decision is diffused over a large number of people.
• The overuse of the SAS process leads to a decrease in the quality/completeness of the
documents as the owner relies on the large number of reviewers to catch deficiencies.
1
The SAS Guide uses the term “Reviewer” to mean individuals who review and approve a document. The
current SAS process requires each reviewer to insert their initials indicating their approval. This report follows
the SAS Guide and does not distinguish between approver/reviewer for the current state description. However,
in the future state, it is recommended to separate the two terms and be intentional about staff who are
“Reviewers” versus staff who are “Approvers,” and using the RACI methodology to define those terms.
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• The large number of document types that use the SAS process leads to ambiguity as staff feel
it is easier to “SAS everything” than to try and determine or judge whether the document
actually needs to go through the process.
Through work sessions with the ADH department staff, three key tools were created to document and
improve the SAS process: 1) a Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs and Customers (SIPOC) diagram
to capture key information about the current process, 2) a Strategic Compass to identify the goal of
the SAS process and high-level current state process map, and 3) a more detailed current state
process map. The three diagrams are shown in Figures 2-4.
Figure 2 – ADH External Communication Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, and Customers
Source: Developed in work session with ADH staff on 9/3/2024.
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ADH Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 3 – External SAS Strategic Compass
Source: Developed in work session with ADH staff on 9/3/2024.
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ADH Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 4 – Existing SAS Process
Source: Developed in work session with ADH staff on 9/3/2024.
Rationale: The SAS process has become burdensome for staff and ADH wants to improve it to
make departmental decision-making more efficient. The “SAS everything” mentality results in staff
inefficiently spending time submitting, reviewing, and approving documents.
As part of this improvement effort, ADH has recently adopted an electronic document workflow
system (DocuSign's Contract Lifecycle Management (CLM) product). CLM provides the ability for
ADH to electronically route, approve and archive documents. CLM will eventually replace the paper
routing (hand walking the documents from desk to desk) process that is currently in place. ADH is
about halfway through the implementation of CLM and hopes to have all SAS documents routed
electronically by the end of the year. CLM has a “per user” fee structure and based on the current
large number of approvers required by the SAS process, it is cost prohibitive to implement this
solution with the existing review structure. Therefore, from both a cost and an improved efficiency
perspective, right sizing the number of document approvers, selectively managing the document
types that are put through the SAS process and streamlining the overall SAS process is a priority for
ADH.
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Implementation Considerations: In preparing to implement this initiative, the ADH team
identified potential challenges/barriers to improve the SAS process and related potential solutions
in a facilitated work session, the results of which are shown in the diagram presented in Figure 5. In
this diagram, the goal to improve the SAS process is summarized in the blue box; the potential
challenges the team may experience are shown around in red boxes, and the related solutions are
shown in green.
Figure 5 – Interference Diagram – SAS Process Improvement
Source: Developed in work session with ADH staff on 9/3/2024.
Recommended steps for establishing a new SAS process (future state):
• Assess current state of SAS review system (currently in progress):
o Analyze available data and information from current SAS review pipeline to identify
hotspots (divisions or personnel with high volume, bottlenecks)
o Conduct staff interviews across ADH, ensuring comprehensive coverage across
divisions and levels to understand experience of SAS submitters and reviewers
o Conduct step-back assessment of SAS policies to identify areas that may result in
unnecessary submissions or review
• Assemble a SAS workgroup to make recommendations about which documents need to go
through the SAS process and right-size the number of approvers. Carefully think through the
workgroup participants, as the composition of this workgroup is crucial to a successful
outcome. Make sure that high-volume SAS users, as well as a representative cross-section
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of manager/line staff, are included as workgroup participants. Ensure that Boards and
Commissions under ADH’s purview have representation and participate in the workgroup so
that those groups are included in the SAS process improvement recommendations. The
workgroup will:
o Group SAS requests into categories (herein referred to as “SAS categories”) to
develop categories for 1) submission types that can be eliminated, 2) submission
types with the need for a reduced quantity of approvers (i.e., include an option to
inform colleagues without requiring their approval), 3) submission types for which a
streamlined and shortened approval process is needed 4) submission types that
should not undergo any changes.
o Apply the RACI (Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, and Informed) methodology
to each SAS request category to determine who needs to do what for each document
type.
o Optimize the electronic CLM system to improve the efficiency of electronic document
routing and reduce the number of approvers.
Use the results of this analysis to develop recommendations for a streamlined SAS process.
• Obtain executive leadership approval and buy-in for the streamlined SAS process.
• Use an endorsement by the ADH Secretary to launch the new SAS process, refine and adjust
as needed.
• Provide communications, training, and support to staff to onboard them to updated process.
• Communicate the underlying rationale behind the process changes.
• Fully implement the CLM electronic document routing process and discontinue paper
document routing.
• Clarify to leadership who has decision-making authority in different instances and
expectations for communication and collaboration between divisions.
• Provide support/training to reinforce decision-making and accountability for management
and executive leaders.
• Six to 12 months post final roll-out, assess project success and identify opportunities for
further improvement. ADH could bring the workgroup back together to discuss the impact
achieved.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Provide extensive training, support, and guidance to help staff understand the new SAS
system. Consider implementing first with individual departments as pilots to identify any
points of confusion and revise materials and communications before full implementation.
• Conduct targeted review/testing of the review and approval steps for each SAS category to
ensure new policies result in sufficient oversight and do not over-correct to result in under-
review.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: ADH is committed
to improving the efficiency and effectiveness of staff resources. Streamlining the SAS process frees
staff from the burden of unnecessary document review and allows them to focus on the jobs they
were hired to do.
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Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: Using the results of their assessment, the SAS improvement workgroup will update the SAS
process including identifying the number and type of necessary reviewers based on each SAS
category. While most of the essential process steps will likely remain the same, the number of
documents and the number of approvers is expected to be reduced.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
Performance Measures:
• Volume of SAS submissions (expected to decrease);
• Number of staff required to review/approve (expected to decrease);
• Number of staff who must spend time reviewing documents (expected to decrease); and,
• Satisfaction with SAS system (expected to improve).
Baselines will need to be established for each of these measures prior to implementing these
recommendations to enable assessment of the impact. The first three measures can be assessed
from existing SAS system data. For the fourth measure, ADH may consider incorporating a question
into a larger staff survey to capture satisfaction with the SAS system (note that other initiatives
including ADH-4 would benefit from inclusion in a staff survey as well).
Expected Impact:
• Enhance departmental efficiency by reducing time spent on SAS review system, particularly
at the manager level.
• Increase employee satisfaction by right-sizing the number of approvers, empowering staff to
make decisions at the right level within the organization.
• Improve staff relationship with SAS system as it will only be used for approvals of
required/necessary documents and not for “everything.”
• Increase staff visibility into where each document is in the routing/review process through
routing the document electronically.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: Savings in staff time would be expected but will be difficult to quantify.
After implementation, ADH could consider deploying a staff survey that would have employees
estimate the time savings and potentially use information from the survey to quantify estimated
savings.
Change Management Plan: Intentional change management is needed to ensure the success
of this initiative. While the SAS process has become inefficient and is in need of modernization and
improvement, this initiative will likely result in changes in how decisions are made in certain
situations – shifting from diffusion of responsibility approach to more direct ownership for affected
leaders in a given situation. The organization will need to encourage leaders to use other methods to
collaborate and communicate and reinforce the permission for autonomy and accountability for
leaders when decisions need to be made. Once leadership has embraced and approved the new SAS
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process, ADH could use the communication plan below to socialize the message throughout the
organization.
Communication and change management tasks are included in Appendix A – ADH Work Plan and
communication tasks are summarized in Figure 6.
Figure 6 – SAS Process Improvement Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
ADH Executive ● SAS process changes will improve Meeting with ADH CFO
Leadership efficiency by relieving staff of executive staff
unnecessary reviews
● SAS process changes will improve staff
satisfaction as staff find current SAS
process burdensome
ADH staff ● Announcing the launch of the improved ADH Secretary ADH CFO
including Boards SAS process; changes will improve video to all staff
efficiency by relieving you of ADH Secretary
and
Commissions unnecessary reviews
● We are empowering you to right-size
the approval process and it’s okay to
delegate/streamline approvals
ADH staff ● Implementation of SAS process Training videos SAS Process
including Boards including training materials Improvement
and Workgroup – Training
Commissions SAS checklist Subcommittee
for Users
ADH-04: Update Billing System
This initiative updates the billing intake process, back-end resolution, and centralized billing at local
health units to increase reporting accuracy (e.g., include multiple "hard stops” to affirm accuracy,
provide training to staff on supporting reporting), incorporate new technology (e.g., automate and/or
outsource insurance lookup), and develop policies on how to work rejections, reducing employee
rework and ensuring available insurance payments and revenue are accounted for.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Arkansas Department of Health (ADH) has 92
local health offices (referred to as "local health units" or "LHUs") spread across the state. These LHUs
provide different services, depending on the location. Services include (but are not limited to)
immunization administration, (Women, Infants and Children) WIC services, reproductive health
services, testing services for infectious diseases such as HIV, viral hepatitis, etc., tobacco
counseling, Sexually Transmitted Disease (STD) testing and counseling, tuberculosis testing, and
case management.
The mission of the LHUs is to provide services to citizens regardless of their ability to pay. When a
person checks in, they are asked whether they have insurance. Many people are unable (or unwilling)
to provide insurance information. Many reasons contribute to why people are reluctant to share
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insurance information, including patients know they will receive the service for free regardless of
whether they produce their insurance information, patients do not have their information with them
and/or it is easier to say they do not have it, and patients incorrectly believe their insurance rates
would go up through use. LHUs provide services such as reproductive health and STI testing and
treatment that patients prefer to maintain confidential; therefore, ADH will not bill insurance in order
to avoid an insurance EOB being mailed to their residence. Reproductive health services are the only
services that require a sliding scale fee from the patient, although ADH provides services regardless
of ability to pay.
ADH uses Greenway as its billing vendor and Waystar as its claims clearing house. The greenway billing
software is an older billing software product that ADH intends to replace with a new electronic health
record (EHR) solution. Greenway's user interface is challenging, and the software has limited reporting
capabilities. ADH is currently using the Waystar insurance lookup feature (called Coverage Detection) to
verify citizen third-party insurance in close to real-time. However, unlike other services that only require
name and date of birth, Coverage Detection requires the person’s insurance identification number to
perform the lookup, significantly reducing the tool's effectiveness.
To verify Medicaid/Chip enrollment, ADH uses the DHS Medicaid provider portal (requires only names
and dates of birth to complete a query). As a result of this tool, ADH is able to identify and submit claims
for Medicaid patients and receive payment. The LHUs do not collect deductibles or co-pays. If a patient
is insured but has not met their deductible, ADH renders service and bills the insurance, but does not
collect the deductible from the patient.
Currently, ADH Billing Specialists, classified as GS-4s. ADH has eight billing specialists in LHUs
across the state and ADH is focused on improving the billing process. In the past year, ADH
successfully introduced credit card payments as a payment method in the LHUs. This project was a
significant achievement, resulting in positive feedback from citizens, who were appreciative of this
new payment option, and increased revenue for the department. Leadership believes that the
“lessons learned” from the credit card implementation can be used to roll-out the process
improvements identified in this initiative.
Through work sessions with the ADH billing staff, two key tools were created to document and
improve the billing process: 1) a Strategic Compass to identify the goal of the billing process and a
high-level current state process map, and 2) a more detailed current state process map. The two
diagrams are shown in Figures 7 and 8:
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Figure 7 – External Billing Strategic Compass
Source: Developed in work session with ADH staff on August 27, 2024
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Figure 8 – Existing Billing Process
Source: Developed in work session with ADH staff on August 27, 2024.
Rationale: LHUs have two primary goals. First and foremost, they want to provide services to all
citizens when in need, regardless of the person’s ability to pay. However, a second goal is to be a good
steward of state resources, and where a citizen (or their insurance provider) can pay, ADH aims to
collect revenue through claims payment. The objectives of this initiative are to:
• Increase claims revenue collection where feasible; and,
• Decrease burden on staff caused by rejected claims that must be re-worked.
A closely related initiative (ADH-05 – Electronic Health Record) aims to replace the current Greenway
billing software with an electronic health record (EHR). This project is longer-term, and ADH does not
expect to implement the EHR until 2026. In the interim, ADH wants to improve billing processes in
preparation for that implementation. ADH could implement several short-term process
improvements, and those improvements would be helpful to the EHR initiative as well, so effort
would not be wasted.
Through interviews and a process mapping session, several key areas for process improvement were
identified, including:
• Obtain reports that show rejection and denial reasons:
o Waystar should be able to provide reports on rejection reasons.
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o DHS Medicaid should be able to provide a report showing the top 10 denial reason by
location ID.
o Similarly, the large commercial insurance companies (Blue Cross, United Health, etc.)
should also be able to provide a report showing the top 10 denial reasons.
• Assign a staff person to analyze these reports to look for the reasons for rejection/denials
and, where applicable, develop resources and provide training to correct the cause. For
example, if the reports by location show that modifiers need to be correctly applied, reach
out to the billing specialist(s) in the impacted location and show them the correct use of
modifiers.
• Develop desk-level guides for Billing Specialists with step-by-step instructions for accurate
coding and preventing errors.
• Develop training materials targeting top rejection/denial reasons and show staff how to fix
errors and submit clean claims.
• Replace the Coverage Detection insurance lookup with a tool that allows insurance coverage
search by name and date of birth.
• Investigate Coverage Detection insurance lookup features to see if it might offer an option to
do insurance coverage lookup using only a patient name and date of birth. If not, consider
replacing Coverage Detection with another tool.
• Develop educational materials and website information to educate patients on the benefits
of providing their insurance information.
• Continue the workgroups that bring together billing specialists and third-party claims staff to
share information. Use the output from these workgroups to develop “cheat sheets” and best
practice guidelines for the billing specialists.
Implementation Considerations: In preparing to implement this initiative, the ADH team
identified potential challenges/barriers to improve the billing process and related potential solutions
in a facilitated work session. The output from this session is shown in the diagram presented in Figure
9. In this diagram, the goal for the process is summarized in the blue box; the potential challenges
the team may experience during the transition are shown in the red boxes, and the related solutions
are shown in the green boxes.
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Figure 9 – Existing Billing Goals/Challenges/Solutions Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with ADH staff on August 24, 2024.
Because ADH is also actively working on the implementation of the new EHR software, some may
prefer to wait to implement process improvements until the implementation of the EHR. However,
ADH has the opportunity to implement several key process improvements that would increase staff
satisfaction and revenue collection in the short-term time period leading up the EHR
implementation. All of the proposed improvements would be beneficial in the interim period and
would complement the EHR as it is rolled out. ADH will need to identify owners who can champion
each of the process improvements.
Recommended steps for establishing billing process improvements:
• Assess the current state of the billing system:
o Conduct staff interviews/focus groups at a sample of local health units and other staff
involved in finance and billing to understand common errors.
o Conduct interviews with citizens using services at local health units to understand
common reasons for incorrect or no insurance reporting.
• Conduct a step-back assessment of billing system policies to inventory current guidance,
training, and systems to identify opportunities for improvement.
• Request rejection reason report from Waystar and denial reason code reports from DHS and
large commercial payers.
• Move forward with several process improvements incorporating options shared in ADH
interviews, including:
o Investigate Coverage Detection insurance lookup features to see if it might offer an option
to do insurance coverage lookup using only a patient name and date of birth. If not,
consider replacing Coverage Detection with another tool. Educate staff on how to use
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new features/tools and consistently use insurance coverage lookup for every patient.
(NOTE: staff currently perform a Medicaid lookup for all patients; suggest using the new
tool after the Medicaid lookup for all patients who are non-Medicaid). This should also
significantly reduce the number of claims that are denied for coordination of benefits
(COB) as patient insurance can be identified correctly.
o Identify an owner to collect rejection/denial reason reports by service location. Use
rejection/denial reasons to educate Billing Specialists in each service location and
reduce errors.
• Create education/training materials on top rejection/denial reasons to proactively educate
new and existing staff on preventing common errors.
• Continue to bring together Billing Specialists with the third-party administrator unit to
collaborate and understand/resolve issues.
• Potentially identify claims bot software that is compatible with Greenway. Explore the
potential use of the BOT to improve clean claim submission.
• Create new guidance documents and conduct live training with local health unit staff and
other staff involved in billing and local health unit revenue.
• Building on the successful implementation of credit cards, use the ADH credit card project
transition plan to implement process improvements in the LHUs, refining and adjusting as
needed.
• Collect metrics and conduct regular retrospectives to assess success and identify necessary
changes and improvements.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Provide extensive and proactive training, support, and guidance on process improvements
for staff and patients. Ensure that staff understand that the ADH priority is to render services
regardless of patient insurance status. A secondary goal is to work with patients to obtain
insurance information, when applicable, and to submit clean claims for payment. ADH must
balance the need to provide the patient services regardless of ability to pay, with due
diligence to work with the patient to understand that providing insurance information will not
jeopardize their service delivery in any way. Educate patients on the benefits of providing
insurance information.
• Engage staff early to incorporate their ideas into improving the billing process to support
process improvement and obtain buy-in for the initiative. Take steps to improve and optimize
the current process in preparation for the longer-term implementation of the EHR, which will
enhance the tool used in the billing process.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: ADH is committed
to improving the efficiency and effectiveness of staff resources. ADH wants to reduce the burden on
staff by improving the billing process. Reducing the number of rejected/denied claims eliminates the
need for staff to spend hours re-working claims they could have submitted correctly the first time.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: While most of the essential processes will likely remain the same until implementation of
the EHR, taking steps to increase identification of patient insurance coverage and reduce the number
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of rejected/denied claims will significantly improve staff satisfaction and increase revenue
collection.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
• Percentage of rejected and inappropriately denied claims (expect this to decrease);
• Collected revenue by LHUs (expect this to increase); and,
• Staff satisfaction rate (as measured by a staff survey) (expect this to increase).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: Staff have estimated that increasing revenue collection through improved
identification of patient insurance coverage and improved clean claim submission rates could have
a positive annual reoccurring financial impact of approximately $0.5 million over current collections.
This estimate is based on the cost of replacing the current insurance look-up tool with a tool that
allows lookup without the insurance number would be offset by increased revenue collection.
Change Management Plan: Executive support for the process improvements will help staff be
on board and facilitate change management. Executives could show their support using existing ADH
communication channels (i.e., team meetings, emails). Key communication tasks are included in
Figure 10 below.
Figure 10 – ADH-4 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
ADH Executive ● Billing process changes will improve Staff meetings ADH CFO
Leadership efficiency by decreasing number of
rejected/denied claims Intranet banner
● Improved insurance look-up process messages
will identify more patients with
Email to staff
insurance and increase revenue.
LHU patients ● Providing your insurance information Social media ADH CFO
will not make your rates go up
● Providing your insurance information Informational
will allow ADH to serve more people materials in the
LHUs (e.g.,
posters, fliers)
ADH-05: Electronic Health Record (EHR)
This initiative seeks to replace ADH’s current electronic health record (EHR) system with a system
that performs better for local health units and is more user-friendly for their staff, is interoperable
with other systems, and centralizes and simplifies billing to reduce time spent on billing, improves
reporting capabilities, and address revenue leakage.
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADH has begun its project to assess the current EHR
processes and the billing tool (Greenway) and explore the feasibility of implementing a new EHR for
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its 92 local health department offices (known as local health units or LHUs). Services include (but
are not limited to) immunization administration, (Women, Infants and Children) WIC services,
reproductive health services, testing services for infectious diseases such as HIV and viral hepatitis,
etc. tobacco counseling, STD testing and counseling, tuberculosis testing and case management.
The billing tool ADH uses (Greenway) is an older, billing software product that has a challenging user
interface. The software also has an antiquated database design that results in extremely limited
reporting capabilities.
The EHR project is funded through a grant from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
(CDC), which extends through November 2027. The grant is anticipated to support all phases of the
EHR project from initiation through implementation. ADH expects that the revenue generated from
increased efficiency and higher claim collection will help offset costs once the grant has expired.
ADH began the EHR requirement gathering and Request for Proposal (RFP) development project in
August 2024 and expects to complete the planning by December 2024. ADH selected a vendor (Baker
Tilley) to assist them with requirements gathering and Request for Proposal (RFP) development. The
five phases of the project include project initiation, project planning, requirements gathering, key
performance indicator (KPI) development, and cost evaluation. The project culminates with a
recommendation presentation to executives. Below is a description and timeline for the five phases.
Phase 1: Project Initiation (Week 1 – completed)
The EHR project team met with Baker Tilly, the contracted vendor for this project, to review the scope
of work and develop an implementation plan. Weekly meetings with a project team comprising over
40 individuals from various program areas within the ADH were established to ensure representation
of stakeholders and participation throughout the organization. Additionally, a steering committee
comprised of executive leadership and subject matter experts was formed to provide oversight and
strategic direction.
Phase 2: Project Planning (Week 2 - completed)
The team developed a comprehensive project plan outlining the timeline and weekly deliverables.
The team also created detailed schedules to coordinate the involvement of the project team and
steering committee. By the end of this phase, ADH and their vendor, Baker Tilly, had a clear
understanding of the project's objectives, timelines, and roles.
Phase 3: Requirements Gathering (Weeks 3 through 8 – in-progress)
The team is currently in the requirements-gathering phase, which will be completed over an eight-
week period. The goal is to develop a comprehensive list of the requirements for the features and
functionalities of the EHR system so that these requirements can be included in an RFP to procure
an EHR. A total of 38 requirement topics were identified, and each topic area was further broken into
various subcategories. By the end of this phase, the EHR project team will have a robust and
comprehensive set of requirements ready for inclusion in the RFP.
Phase 4: KPI Development and Cost Evaluation (Week 8 – 14)
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ADH and Baker Tilley will establish baseline metrics (Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) for the EHR
system. These KPIs will measure EHR performance and focus on user satisfaction, data quality,
patient outcomes, revenue collection, and system efficiency. The team will conduct a cost
evaluation to ensure that any recommendations for EHR implementation are financially viable and
demonstrate a clear return on investment for ADH.
Phase 5: Recommendation Presentation (Week 15-16) In the project's final phase, the EHR team will
present findings and recommendations to ADH's executive leadership. The presentation will
summarize the results of the requirements-gathering process, present KPIs, and provide a detailed
cost-benefit analysis. The outcome of this phase will be a set of actionable recommendations that
ADH can use to inform the publication of an RFP.
The EHR team anticipates completing all requirement modules by October 4, 2024. The team will
continue refining the documents, with final drafts ready before the project presentation in the last
week of November 2024. The requirement modules include:
1. Analytics 15. Issue Escalation 27. Revenue Cycle
2. Backups and Recovery 16. Medical Records Functional and
3. Be Well Arkansas 17. Network Technology
4. Breast Care 18. Orders Requirements
5. Cervical Cytology 19. Organizational 28. Risk Management
6. Clinical Documentation Change 29. Security
7. Community Team- Management 30. Sexually Transmitted
Based Care 20. Perinatal Health Infections
8. Data Conversion 21. Physician 31. Staffing Resource
Requirements - ADH Requirements Requirements
9. EMR Application 22. Registration 32. System
Security Functional and 33. Modifications /
10. Hardware Technology Updates
11. Implementation Requirements 34. Technology
Work Plan / Strategy / 23. Registration / Architecture
Team Structure Scheduling 35. Training Functional and
12. Integration 24. Reporting & Data Technology
13. Interface Warehouse Requirements
Requirements – Requirements - ADH 36. Tuberculosis
14. ADH Interoperability 25. Reproductive Health 37. Vendor Hosted
26. Revenue Cycle 38. Women, Infant and
Children (WIC)
Rationale: Citizen health data collection is fragmented and patient health records are not readily
available. ADH wants to improve clinical quality by providing more ready access to all relevant
clinical information during patient encounters. ADH wants the ability to quickly identify patients due
for health maintenance or other clinical tests and follow-ups. ADH can improve service quality by
providing copies of clinical notes/recommendations for follow-up to patients at the completion of a
patient visit.
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The LHUs, serving thousands of Arkansans, often find their offices crowded as ADH staff strive to
serve the public. The implementation of an EHR will improve the efficiency of the LHUs, and the
staff's role in this transition is crucial. They will be provided with an advanced tool for managing most
aspects of their work, and their feedback and involvement will be integral to the success of this
process. In addition, replacement of the EHR will allow ADH to replace its current antiquated billing
software, which reduce the number of rejected/denied claims and increase revenue. In the two years
leading up to the EHR implementation, ADH intends to implement several short-term billing process
improvements that are outlined in a companion initiative (ADH-04). These process improvements
pave the way for the future implementation of the EHR.
Implementation Considerations:
Recommended steps for establishing the EHR for local health departments:
• Implement the first five phases of the EHR planning project that were described in the
previous section including: project initiation, project planning, requirements gathering,
KPI/cost-benefit analysis, and presentation of recommendations.
• Develop and issue the RFP.
• Evaluate and procure an EHR vendor.
• Develop a transition plan including timelines and milestones to address interdependencies
with current billing software and patient health records.
• Securely migrate data over time to the new EHR.
• Develop a mitigation plan to minimize potential disruptions to local health unit services.
Include a communication/change management plan to ensure that LHU staff know what is
happening and when.
• Revise existing policies and procedures, as applicable, to align with new EHR.
• Develop and provide comprehensive training for all users of the new EHR system to ensure
they are comfortable and proficient with the new technology.
• Implement new EHR system and monitor transition, track KPIs, and address issues.
• Continuously track EHR performance using data dashboards and periodically review to
identify additional opportunities for improvement,
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Modernizing and
improving its EHR will improve ADH’s ability to deliver quality services through access to better
patient health information. Additionally, ADH wants to increase revenue collection and reduce staff
burden by improving the tool staff use in the billing process. Reducing the number of rejected/denied
claims eliminates the need for staff to spend hours re-working claims they could have submitted
correctly the first time. As an added benefit, clean claims submission will improve revenue
collection, enabling ADH to subsidize EHR expenses.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
Implementing a new EHR system will likely result in significant process changes for the LHUs as staff
learn to use it for data collection, appointment scheduling, patient check-in/check-out, service
delivery, claim submission, reporting, and quality assurance. ADH must carefully plan the rollout to
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ADH Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
pilot the new process and have iterative feedback loops to ensure process improvements as the EHR
is implemented across all 92 LHUs.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
Expected Impact of the EHR Implementation:
• Enhanced LHU efficiency by reducing amount of effort staff need to spend entering/obtaining
data, scheduling patients;
• Increased interoperability with other sources of patient data;
• Increased revenue due to higher level of insurance matching and increased submission of
clean claims;
• Improved reporting capabilities through enhanced reporting features and automation; and,
• Improved service to patients through use of a patient portal.
Performance Measures:
As part of the EHR planning phase, the team will identify KPIs for the EHR. ADH should carefully
monitor and assess the effectiveness of these KPIs and adjust as necessary. ADH has identified the
following performance measures that will be part of the future KPIs:
• Time staff spend using the EHR system (e.g., time to input or pull information, time to create
reports for grant management) (expected to decrease);
• Number of duplicate or erroneous patient accounts (expected to decrease);
• Number of rejected and inappropriately denied claims (expected to decrease); and,
• Collected revenue (expected to increase).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: ADH has estimated that implementation of a modern EHR has the potential
to have improved revenue collection, improved efficiencies, and cost savings/avoidance. These
savings will be offset by the cost of the EHR. During the planning process, the team will conduct a
cost evaluation to ensure that any recommendations for EHR implementation are financially viable
and demonstrate a clear return on investment for ADH.
Change Management Plan: Intentional change management is needed to ensure the success
of the EHR implementation. Transitioning to the new EHR is a huge undertaking and, in the short-
term, will cause disruption for ADH staff. Careful transition planning, targeted communication, and
adequate training will be required to ensure the success of the implementation. The organization will
need to expect bumps, be patient, and believe that the long-term gain is worth the short-term pain.
ADH could use the communication plan below to announce the upcoming EHR implementation.
Figure 11 provides the key communication plan tasks related to this initiative.
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ADH Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 11 – EHR Implementation Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Staff • ADH is investing in an EHR to • Town hall. • Secretary
impacted by better serve our customers • Face-to-Face team • Impacted division
changes and fulfill our mission. meetings with leads
• The EHR will offer staff an leadership, future • Communication
improved tool and increase manager, and former Director
efficiency and job satisfaction. manager.
• Detailed description of
changes, including specific
changes for every team
impacted by the EHR.
Other ADH • The implementation of the • Town hall. • Communication
staff EHR will improve efficiency. • All staff email. Director
• High level summary of
changes.
ADH-08: Improve customer experience at local health units
This initiative seeks to improve customer experiences at local health units operated by the ADH by
leveraging data, reviewing operational performance to identify opportunities for improvement, and
developing actionable strategies. ADH seeks to implement this initiative in alignment with the
statewide strategy of achieving operational excellence by optimizing the AR citizen experience
through digitization.
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADH delivers a broad range of public health
preventative and regulatory services statewide. With a central office location, ADH manages 92 Local
Health Units, with at least one in all of the 75 counties of Arkansas, scheduling over 1.4 million
appointments within the last four years. The Public Health Division workforce performs a variety of
daily functions in the LHUs such as testing for contagious diseases like tuberculosis and screening
for children’s health problems, promoting and providing prevention services like immunizations,
reproductive health services, and provision of WIC (Women, Infants and Children) services.
Beginning in January 2018, ADH implemented a LHU customer satisfaction initiative using text
message, where LHU customers are asked to provide feedback on their experience receiving services
at the LHU four hours after their checkout. Survey questions included:
• How friendly and helpful was the health unit staff?
• How would you rate our scheduling process?
• How would you rate your privacy?
• How would you rate the condition of the health unit?
• Tell us about your wait time and length of visit?
• Overall, how well did we meet your needs?
• Do you plan to use the health unit for services again?
Customers are asked to answer the following questions with the corresponding ratings:
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ADH Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Questions 1-4 Poor Fair Good Excellent
Value 1 2 3 4
Question 5 Very Long Long OK Quick
Value 1 2 3 4
Questions 6 Poor Fair Good Excellent
Value 1 2 3 4
Question 7 Open Ended Comment.
Value N/A
Customer satisfaction scores are calculated individually for each survey completed, averaging
responses for Questions 1 through Question 6. The total score is used as an overall measure of the
customer’s satisfaction with their visit. Approximately 1,000 surveys are sent daily, and ADH
estimates that it takes each customer approximately one minute to complete the survey.
ADH’s goal was to collect data to gain insight into the following areas:
• Did customer response differ by program service received?
• Did customer satisfaction metric differ by LHU where services were received?
• Did customer satisfaction metric differ between Pre-, During, and Post- COVID time periods?
• What were the most frequently used terms and phrases used by survey customers to make
comments?
• Did customer satisfaction metric differ between the current and previous report?
From August 2019 to August 2023, there were 1.4 million appointments across the local health units,
with 650,000 survey invitations being accessed. According to ADH, customers completed 27,000
resulting in a survey response rate of 4.2%. To date, most of the survey data has been positive, with
the primary complaint being long wait times.
Despite the existence of this survey, in a staff focus group, staff identified multiple gaps in data
collection and use:
• The satisfaction survey was originally developed in Google Docs, and the tool has lost
functionality over the years.
• There are questions about the response rate as the number of texts sent does not align to
total patients seen. The methodology for outreach is in need of review. Also, there are missed
opportunities to improve the response rate. LHUs could do more to promote the survey.
• Staff do not have the ability to easily extract their region’s data to know how each region
compares. There is an effort to improve this by moving the survey platform to a Microsoft 365
product.
• Having some customer service data is not enough. There are opportunities for improvement
by addressing the lack of training for customer-facing staff and the absence of a regular,
consistent analysis of trends over time, and the creating a process to review survey data with
staff for training purposes.
Given these gaps, the group identified five opportunities for improvement:
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• Provide customer service training at the LHUs. Staff training does not include insight into the
customer survey process and the importance of engaging clients to complete the survey.
o Create training curriculum for staff that defines expectations for customer service and
provides guidance. Training would include specific examples of how member facing roles
could provide improved customer service. Include the data evaluation component that
leadership will complete to drive operational decisions and recognize high performing
outcomes by staff and LHUs. Showcase incentives and reward recognition to be
implemented (if applicable).
o Create a standardized process for LHUs to engage customers in the survey when they are
interacting with them to schedule appointments, access services in person and when
leaving the premises. Consider the creation of visual tools (e.g., posters in the LHUs) to
express the importance and value of the customer’s voice when filling out the survey.
Evaluate the possibility for staff to work with the customer to fill out the survey before
they leave the appointment either verbally, with a survey card to complete and submit or
both.
• Update the survey technology platform to allow for automated reports broken down by region
and LHU. Currently, the ability to stratify and extrapolate data is difficult and cumbersome to
filter. This results in administrative burden as it requires manual effort to extract data
regionally and locally. Ensure automation, stratification and extrapolation capabilities exist
for tracking, trending, reporting, and distributing results amongst partners statewide and by
region and LHU.
• Increase the survey response rate through other mechanisms including:
o Incorporate the use of verbal, in-person engagement and visual reminders such as
posters or fliers encouraging customers to complete the survey.
o Utilize and assess online customer review platforms. Consider developing a strategy to
begin incorporating online customer review platforms such as the ADH and LHU websites
to complete a survey. Consideration should also be given to reviewing YELP and Google
reviews for additional insight to customer service provided in an LHU environment.
• Increase the cadence of the analyzing the survey results and sharing with team members:
o ADH is transitioning between survey platforms. The survey was originally created in
Google Docs but has lost functionality and the department is in the process of adopting
Microsoft 365 products going forward.
o Evaluate and solidify the survey platform. System capabilities must have consistent
functionality to support the needs of this initiative and allow for automation to track,
trend, report, and distribute information gathered.
o Use results to target improvements.
o Implement standardized processes and operational practices to incorporate customer
surveys into a quality assurance process.
o Standardize leadership protocols to utilize customer surveys for quality assurance to
improve the experience of the LHU customer.
Rationale: The quality of service delivery and customer experience influence how patients view
LHUs and their trust and satisfaction with ADH overall. ADH is committed to enhancing the overall
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experience of the customers they serve at LHUs. Through this initiative focused on improving
customer service at LHUs, ADH has an opportunity to:
• Analyze the existing service process and identify opportunities for improvement;
• Launch updated survey and tools;
• Set customer service goals at the state, regional, and local level using key performance
indicators (e.g., all LHUs will have a satisfaction rate of 90%) and define expectations of
customer service delivery for staff;
• Deploy training for LHU staff to reinforce customer service expectations, at the job role level;
• Develop and launch reporting resources for managers to support increased acumen and
establish expectations for data use with their teams; and,
• Prioritize discussions about data and model behavior for leaders on how they can use data
with their teams; and,
• Create operational processes to utilize customer surveys for quality assurance.
Implementation Considerations:
Other states have demonstrated creativity to measure customer satisfaction scores and build upon
the feedback received to improve experiences. The experience from other states may be valuable for
ADH to review and potentially incorporate. For example:
• Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO): ASTHO prepared a toolkit for
states (developed based on work in seven states) to assist in creation of public health
department customer feedback surveys. There are several sample surveys included in the
toolkit, as well as questions for consideration when designing and implementing a survey,
and analyzing survey results.2
• Texas: Texas statute requires a biennial report about the quality of services provided to
customers through the Health and Human Services System. This includes the State’s Department
of Health Services (DSHS), which administers many programs similar in scope to Arkansas
Department of Health. The 2022 report includes analysis of surveys used across the HHS
enterprise including at DSHS. There is a satisfaction survey of families of children with special
health care needs, as well as others that could be adapted by ADH.3
• Minnesota: The Minnesota Department of Health published a resource to help public health
agencies and programs achieve a customer-focused culture.4 They provide guidance for
identifying customers, prioritizing focus areas, determining customer needs and
requirements, guidance to collect and analyze customer information and taking action to use
and share customer feedback. Minnesota provides guidance for public health agencies to
consider different methods to gather customer feedback through surveys, focus groups,
2
ASTHO, “Measuring Customer Satisfaction Nine Steps to Success,”
https://www.astho.org/globalassets/pdf/accreditation/measuring-customer-satisfaction-nine-steps-to-success.pdf
3
Texas Department of Health and Human Services, “2022 Report on Customer Service,” June 1, 2022,
https://www.hhs.texas.gov/sites/default/files/documents/2022-customer-service-report.pdf.
4
Minnesota Department of Health, Customer Focus in Public Health, December 2015,
https://www.health.state.mn.us/communities/practice/qi/customerfocus/docs/customerfocus.pdf.
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interviews and comment/complaint cards notating the advantages, disadvantages, best
practices, and preferred analysis methods.
• Los Angeles (LA) County: The LA County Department of Public Health (DPH) created a
Customer Satisfaction Toolkit to improve overall and program-level customer satisfaction
with DPH programs and services. 5 Many DPH programs collected customer feedback. DPH
wanted to expand opportunities to ensure the feedback received was collected and utilized
to enhance existing customer service. In this toolkit, they offer guidelines and templates for
external customers, internal staff, partners, and stakeholders. Included are action plan
questions utilized and included a sample of their survey analysis template.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Becoming a more customer service-focused department will require buy-in from staff.
Leadership must clearly communicate how the new processes will increase the quality of
services delivered and streamline LHU operations for staff. To promote staff adoption and LHU
championing, ADH must clearly define expectations through standardized training for each LHU
employee role that is member facing. ADH must put an accountability process in place to
evaluate how employees meet the new expectations by measuring their success in meeting the
new requirements.
• Consideration should also be given to deploying a reward program that incentivizes staff and
motivates them to embrace the new customer service quality processes. A reward program
should consider recognizing individual staff, LHUs, and spotlight regions who are top
performers in customer service quality. Reward those LHUs that produce the highest amount
of customer survey completion, and have the most improved scores since the last review.
Individual rewards and unit recognition will expedite preferred outcomes and promote
healthy competition amongst peers and departments to outshine one another while
promoting the increased satisfaction of customers they serve.
Recommended steps for improving customer service at LHUs (future state):
ADH staff demonstrated agreement around the need for improvement and an understanding that
data should inform improvement initiatives. Factors for consideration in reviewing and revising the
survey include:
• Identify who will be sent a survey. Questions to consider when designing the survey process
include: Will all LHU customers who completed a visit receive a survey or only LHU
customers who accessed a certain service? Should only new LHU customers be engaged or
reoccurring LHU customers with 2+ visits within a certain time frame? If all customers are
engaged - is there the capability to tell the difference between the type of customer, you are
surveying? Is there a need to?
• Review and validate the questions being used remain those to continue to be used going
forward. If not, modify and finalize, as necessary.
5
Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, Customer Satisfaction Toolkit, January 2023,
http://publichealth.lacounty.gov/qiap/docs/CustomerSatisfaction/CS-SurveyGuidelines.pdf.
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• Determine survey methods to be utilized. Questions to consider when designing the survey
process include: Will you be utilizing text message surveys only? Is there interest and capabilities
to also offer in-person surveys when customers are leaving LHUs? What about telephone
surveys? Is an email survey an option? If so, how will emails be obtained and utilized for the
survey process?
• Establish survey frequency and duration. Questions to consider when designing the survey
process include: What is the timeline that will occur for customers to complete the survey?
What is the time frame for ADH to collect, track and trend responses?
• Decipher what the evaluation process to review data will be. Questions to consider when
designing the survey process include: How often will data be reviewed? Who will collect the
data and stratify the results to allow for statewide, regional, and local reporting? Is there
interest and capability to create scorecards for LHUs to identify high performing units and
staff for recognition? How will these be created and maintained for ongoing review?
• Implementation of follow-up protocols amongst internal stakeholders to identify what
actions will take place based on the survey outcomes. Questions to consider when designing
the survey process include: Did operational changes take place because of the survey data
received? If so which ones and where? How will this information be documented for record
keeping? How will high performing LHUs and individual staff be recognized? How will low-
performing LHUs and staff be engaged to improve?
Factors for consideration in using the data to drive process improvement:
• Who is responsible for analyzing and trending findings?
• Can the department create automated reporting with drill-down capability by region and
LHU?
• What goals will ADH leadership establish for satisfaction and what will under-performing
LHUs be required to do to remediate performance (i.e., develop an action plan)?
• How will ADH become a more data-driven, customer service-focused department? How will
top performers be recognized? What resources can be identified to support managers in
using data – examples include lunch and learns where leaders share their ideas and best
practices, training for management on using data to drive process improvement, and
modeling behavior by incorporating review of customer service data at every leadership
meeting.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative aligns
with ADH’s mission to improve the health and well-being of all Arkansans by utilizing customer
feedback to improve service delivery protocols and enhance customer experiences at local health
units.
ADH seeks to implement this statewide initiative of achieving operational excellence by optimizing
citizen experience through use of modern survey tools. Utilizing survey platforms that are easily
accessible to customers so they can share their experience quickly and easily will promote the
increase of customer engagement and survey completions. Streamlining and automating the survey
data collection will expedite ADH’s ability to review and respond to customer feedback and improve
customer satisfaction. Highlighting and rewarding the positive work staff are performing will
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positively impact employee morale. It will also promote active engagement for change when
employee problems arise.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
This initiative will require statewide communication within the Division of Local Public Health, Local
Unit Administrators, Nurse Managers and Division of Public Health Practice to ensure everyone is
educated and made aware of changes and new expectations.
Standardized checkpoints will need to be identified to ensure consistent data collection, analysis,
and use, as well as ensure the appropriate setting state, regional, and local goals for performance.
There should be proactive scheduling of meetings or inclusion of an agenda item in standing
meetings for leadership to review the survey findings and encouragement of active dialogue to
promote awareness of changes that need to occur to standardize operations including a timeline of
when those changes should be implemented.
Statewide processes will also need to be created for staff training both onboarding and ongoing
annual training. An employee rewards program should also be considered to recognize and reward
high performing employees and LHUs.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: This initiative is
expected to increase awareness of the customer service survey and promote engagement and
encourage customers to submit their feedback; increase customer satisfaction with the LHU
experience; enhance visibility into the quality of services delivered at the LHUs; reduce
administrative burden when collecting and stratifying data; and evaluate the opportunity for
leadership to consistently review and engage their teams based on the outcomes of their customer
service surveys. Metrics to track the impact of this initiative include:
• Number of visits completed within the designated time per LHU, regionally and statewide.
• Number of surveys distributed to customers per LHU, regionally and statewide.
• Number of surveys completed by customers per LHU, regionally and statewide.
• Customer satisfaction rate (e.g., Net Promoter Score) within state fiscal years per LHU,
regionally and statewide.
• Utilization volume by service for each LHU, regionally and statewide.
• Percent of new and overall staff who receive customer service training.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: It is not anticipated this initiative will result in cost savings. Existing
resources will need to be accessed to enhance marketing efforts, training development and project
management. Marketing support is needed for creating standardized messaging for survey
awareness visuals, materials, and opportunities. Training development expertise will be required to
define expectations and accountability of LHUs and their staff to engage customers to participate in
the survey process that aligns with the marketing resources created. Consideration will need to be
given to determine if LHU staff training will be in person, if virtual training sessions be offered or if a
hybrid of both will be used for all LHUs to be informed as to the new requirements.
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Project management support is needed to ensure that staff are supported and able to meet
deliverables in a timely manner and that project efforts stay on task. ADH will need to consider the
cost of technological resources needed to secure a reliable and efficient survey software platform
that will deliver effective automation and stratification capabilities for data collection.
Change Management Plan: Standardized messaging and communications across ADH, LHUs
and staff will be critical to deploy unified expectations to enhance LHU customer satisfaction and
engage customers to share their feedback regarding their experiences. Key activities and timing for
communication plan are included in Appendix A – ADH Work Plan and provided in Figure 12 below.
Figure 12 – ADH-08 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Division of Local Public ● We are enhancing our ● Division Sherian Kwanisai and
Health staff and Division customer survey process meetings Department Leadership
of Public Health Practice to increase the
(Data Support) staff engagement of clients ● Staff
served so they can share meetings
their experiences to help
us improve the way we
deliver services at LHUs.
● We will also standardize
our survey data
collection with
automation and
stratification capabilities
to consistently review
measures statewide,
regionally and locally.
● Accountability protocols
will be implemented to
ensure leadership is
utilizing our data findings
to implement and modify
LHU operational
practices for
improvement.
ADH-09: Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and
efficiency
This initiative is part of the broader Arkansas Forward Agile Organization initiative and includes
implementing a tailored and modernized organization to ensure effective distribution of
management responsibilities, enhanced operational efficiency, and improved role clarity among
managerial positions.
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADH has established shared services for finance,
human resources, IT, and communications. There are five programmatic divisions: Division of Health
Advancement, Division of Health Protection; Division of Local Public Health, Division of Health Data
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ADH Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
and Analytics; and the Public Health Laboratory. ADH desired to conduct a review of its organization
structure to identify opportunities for improvement.
Rationale: Through this initiative, the project team facilitated discussion with each division leader
to identify opportunities to create a more agile organization. Multiple factors were considered
including:
• Span of Control: There are certain divisions with a high number of small teams (i.e., Division
of Local Public Health, Division of Health Advancement, and Division of Health Protection).
The Division of Local Public Health’s organization structure exists to support LHUs across the
state and ensure consistency statewide. In the Divisions of Health Advancement and Health
Protection, federal funding is the primary driver for the staffing structure. There are federal
grant requirements regarding the use of dedicated staff positions and there are often
prohibitions on staff cross-charging time across programs. In the short-term, while this
federal grant funding is available, ADH will not be able to change its staffing model. I However,
in the future, if there is risk of reduction in federal funds, ADH may consider opportunities to
consolidate some of these teams.
• Number of Managerial Layers: In some of the divisions where there was a higher occurrence
of small teams, the organization often contained additional management layers. Existence
of additional layers can result in delayed decision-making or slow communication. Two
divisions were already seeking to collapse layers upon retirements or other vacancies. This
approach enables the organization to become more efficient, while minimizing staff
abrasion.
• Opportunity for Shared Services Consolidation: ADH has made a number of organizational
changes since the 2019 transformation and has moved to implement shared services and
other efficiencies to support its divisions. In conducting a division-by-division review, the
project team identified that there are a small numbers of staff who have not been
consolidated. For example, there are some IT application staff embedded within
programmatic divisions. There is an IT team located within the Public Health Laboratory.
However, due to the specialized nature of the team’s work, the department does not
anticipate there would be a benefit to transferring this team to the CIO. However, in instances
like this, the department can realize improvements by creating a stronger dotted line
relationship between the IT team in the Laboratory and the team reporting to the CIO. This
would allow for enhanced staff professional development and consistency of operations.
Overall, several division leaders exhibited practices consistent with an agile organization, including:
• Using data to determine workload (e.g., in the Laboratory, a historical basis of volume guides
staffing levels);
• Reviewing positions upon vacancy and determining whether to fill or eliminate;
• Using vacancies as an opportunity to collapse organizational layers; and,
• Combining like-functioning teams previously housed in different locations of the
organization.
Implementation Considerations: At this time, no organization structure changes were
identified. However, there are considerations to:
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ADH Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Continue to have discussions with senior leadership about the principles of agile organization to
reinforce the expectation that ADH should strive to be as organizationally efficient as possible.
• Encourage each leader to look within their organization for opportunities to eliminate
managerial layers;
• Direct each leader to review the necessity of positions upon becoming vacant and use those
opportunities to make the organization more efficient with less abrasion;
• Create forums for leaders who have transformed their organization’s structure to share best
practices with colleagues to encourage similar actions across the organization; and,
• Create dotted line reporting relationships where all staff for a functional area have not been
consolidated into a shared services team (i.e., IT) to realize benefits from greater
collaboration.
Appendix A – ADH Work Plan – provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
This initiative is not expected to require change management or other risks. The Division Leader will
want to ensure impacted staff understand the reason for the change, and that roles and
responsibilities for the team are created to ensure they best support the Division Director.
Recommended steps to implement changes to ADH’s organization structure include: Working
with directly impacted staff to make the organization change.
Alignment with department priorities staffing and resources: The proposed
organization chart for ADH is provided above in Figure 1.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: None are anticipated.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: No fiscal impact is
anticipated.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: Metrics are not
anticipated to be required to implement this initiative.
In addition to these measures, surveys could be utilized for impacted staff during the transition to
identify and address any issues or concerns.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: This initiative is not expected to result in cost savings.
Change Management: There is an opportunity for leadership to continue to engage
management about the principles of an agile organization and to utilize the framework discussed
above to drive improvements in the organization’s structure in the future.
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ADH-12: Implement cross-training to enhance task coverage and
knowledge continuity
This initiative introduces cross-training across the Arkansas Department of Health (ADH) to ensure
that more than one person knows how to do critical tasks, thereby mitigating knowledge loss in the
event of staff attrition and reducing delays when staff are out or at capacity to ensure business
continuity and improve customer and employee experience.
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADH has approximately 1,969 salaried employees
(as of September 2024). While overall staff turnover (defined as leaving role at ADH) and staff turmoil
(an industry term meaning internal churn caused by staff leaving their role for another position within
the department) are low, reported to be 9.6% and 15.6%, respectively (annualized based on data
through September of current fiscal year), there are pockets of the organization where there are certain
critical roles with no redundancy, meaning that there may be critical delays when these staff are at
capacity, and if staff are out of the office or leave ADH, the organization is at risk. There are also staff
units with high workload (which may or may not be seasonal) or higher staffing vacancies, which results
in overtime worked by existing staff in filled positions. This workload imbalance can contribute to
turnover, low morale, and dissatisfaction.
ADH has reviewed cross training today across its divisions. There are many promising practices. For
example, the Public Health Laboratory has used cross-training within each of its labs. For nearly each
analysis, two or more analysts perform each test. Most laboratory areas rotate assignments to prevent
burnout and ensure cross-training occurs. Within the Division for Data and Analytics, cross-training has
been used across teams. Some best practices to note in the Outbreak Response and Prevention Branch
include:
• Identified an epidemiologist back up for each position;
• Developed Standard Operating Procedures for routine tasks;
• Constructed Desk References for each position (for identified roles);
• Established a shared e-mail so that requests for general programmatic work are not confined
to a single email;
• Created fact sheets, cheat sheets, and scripts for various diseases; and,
• Communicable Disease Nurse Specialist (CDNS) in the field are trained in outbreak response, and we
conduct yearly updates to each region, nurses in the clinic, and CDNS.
Building on the success of some divisions that have successfully used cross-training, ADH has
identified an opportunity to extend cross-training throughout the entire department and to facilitate
a process to ensure consistency in the development of these efforts.
Rationale: ADH-12 directs the ADH to use cross-training as a method to provide redundancy and
address capacity issues in key areas, while also creating a mechanism for staff to enhance their skills
and experience growth by working with other business units.
Workforce Development staff can manage a process to identify areas where there is a need for
redundancy or additional support and to ensure that appropriate resources are identified to be cross-
33
ADH Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
trained. While the actual training will occur within divisions, Workforce Development can oversee
consistent application of cross-training and monitor the effectiveness of the program.
Training and development of staff can help employees learn or strengthen skills, and increase
confidence, motivation, and productivity. Training and mentoring help create a better understanding
of work expectations and an appreciation of the value of the employee’s contributions. Cross-training
best practice adoption can provide quality and service level improvements. If done correctly, cross-
training can improve efficiency. It can also make the job more interesting, make the employee feel
more valued, and enable employee learning and career development. By encouraging a learning /
cross-training culture, ADH ensures that employees take a more active role in their work and help to
spread knowledge and best practices throughout their organization. These factors can support a
more engaged and satisfied workforce, which can improve retention and create a more effective
organization overall.
Cross-training has been used throughout federal, state, and local governments, as well as across the
private sector. Some examples of successful government cross-training programs include:
• City Example: The City of Cody, Wyoming, used has used cross-training for over 20 years to
address gaps in multiple departments and to prepare for retirements. There are several
examples of how staff have supported other departments. The Parks Department’s staff size
decreased due to elimination of a vacancy; the utility meter reader was able to collect trash
as part of their recurring rounds. Some staff have become certified in other fields to support
(i.e., a facility maintenance worker is now also a certified pool technician to support the Parks
Department) The County Clerk and Records Clerk positions were combined. Billing staff in
recreation support in utility billing.6
• County Example: Los Angeles County is the largest in the nation and has adopted cross-
training across programs. One recent example is within the Property Tax group, where four
departments responsible for a portion of the process collaborated to improve constituent
service. The teams formed an Inter-Departmental Steering Committee to troubleshoot issues
and the group was effective because it utilized cross training and staff understood how other
teams operated.7
• Private Sector Examples:
o Job Rotation Programs: Employees rotate through different roles or departments to
gain a broad understanding of the organization. Google’s “20% Time” offers an
example where employees spend a portion of their time working on different projects
or areas.8
6
Government Finance Officers Association, Mark Mack, “Employee Cross-training Employee Cross-training How
small governments can improve efficiency and reduce their risk,” 2020,
https://gfoaorg.cdn.prismic.io/gfoaorg/41c9305f-7a83-4452-894d-be213c0bdf4e_GFR_10-
2020_EmployeeCrossTraining.pdf.
7
Ben Effinger, “The Multi-Functional Manager: Cross-Training and Collaboration for Organizational Success,”
November 1, 2022, https://icma.org/articles/pm-magazine/multi-functional-manager-cross-training-and-
collaboration-organizational-success.
8
Medium, “Google’s “20% Time” Policy, January 27, 2024, https://medium.com/@nareshnavinash/googles-20-
time-policy-60d5706084be.
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ADH Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
o Mentorship Programs: Pairing employees with mentors from different departments
or roles to provide guidance and knowledge. IBM’s mentoring programs is an
example, where employees are matched with senior leaders for cross-functional
learning.
o Shadowing Programs: Employees follow and observe colleagues in different roles to
learn about their responsibilities and daily tasks. The “Job Shadowing” initiative at
Salesforce is an where employees can spend a day shadowing peers in other
departments.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – ADH Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with ADH staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Workforce Development will need to be proactive in working with managers to find teams
with the capacity to be cross trained. There may be reluctance for a manager or staff to admit
that they are not fully utilized now and have capacity.
• ADH may want to build accountability for the secondary assignment into an affected
employee’s annual evaluation. If an employee’s productivity for their secondary assignment
is not monitored and part of their evaluation, the employee may treat this role as optional and
not provide the level of support the unit expects.
• There is a need to develop non-monetary ways to recognize staff for the additional work
performed and to provide an incentive for employees to embrace this program. There is a
statutory provision (Act 172) that provides a means to offer a ten percent increase as well as
a lump sum for $5,000 or 40 hours of leave for employees who take on additional duties.
Still, there are restrictions, and OPM and the Legislature must approve a department’s plan
before implementation. Non-monetary or low-cost recognition methods include
monthly/quarterly breakfasts with the Secretary of Health, nominal gifts such as pins or
awards to thank employees for their contributions, and recognition at all-staff town halls
and in all-staff emails.
• Workforce Development should identify a lead within the Human Resources (HR)
organization to help to sustain this initiative.
• Once the HR Lead pairs units and ensures training occurs, the HR Lead will need to
communicate on an ongoing basis with the impacted managers and staff to ensure the
success of the program. Support for the initiative will extend beyond the initial pairing of the
units, including the need to strengthen the relationship between the unit and its cross-trained
support team.
Recommended steps for establishing a cross-training program (future state):
• The Workforce Development Lead will ask each division leader to identify instances in which
their team could be supported with a cross-trained support team and where they have
capacity to provide staff to support other areas.
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ADH Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• The Workforce Development Lead will review organizational needs for cross-training and
adequacy of resources to address these needs. As required, the Lead will pair identified units
and oversee creation of a training plan.
• Each team will develop standard operating procedures, job aids, and other tools needed to
document key business process and support business continuity.
• For areas where cross-training is identified, the impacted team will develop an on-the-job
training and shadowing plan for the identified resources, seeking help from the Workforce
Development Lead when needed.
• When any teams are paired (such as to assist with seasonal workload fluctuations), the
managers of the paired teams will co-conduct team meetings and other events to strengthen
the relationship between the teams and support collaboration.
• The Workforce Development Lead will work with ADH leadership to modify the annual
performance evaluation process to capture feedback and provide a place to note any areas
where an employee receives cross-training and provides support for additional areas. If an
employee assists another team, goals will be included in the annual performance evaluation
to reinforce this secondary assignment and feedback from the manager of the unit the
employee supports will be included in the evaluation.
• The Workforce Development Lead will identify non-monetary rewards that can be used to
recognize staff for providing support to additional areas.
• The Workforce Development Lead will establish an evaluation plan for the program, including
meeting with all paired teams at least quarterly to monitor the implementation.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative is a
strategy to leverage the skills and capacity of ADH’s current team to support high-impact activities
where there is no redundancy in the staff performing those duties, in areas that are under-staffed,
and in areas with high workloads (or high seasonal workloads). Over time, this effort will strengthen
the skills of ADH’s staff through exposure to additional areas.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: A cross-training program will need to be established, but this is not expected to impact other
existing business processes.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
• Job satisfaction for cross-trained employees – This initiative is expected to increase satisfaction
among the employees who receive cross-training, who feel they are developing and progressing
in their careers.
• “Work stoppage” delays in critical areas and staff productivity – This initiative is expected to
reduce these incidences and increase staff productivity.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: Based on initial estimates validated by the department, ADH-12 has the
potential positive annual reoccurring financial impact related to improved efficiency. This does not
reflect any additional compensation for staff, as that plan has not been identified or approved by
OPM. This initiative could begin implementation within calendar year 2024.
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ADH Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Change Management Plan: This initiative requires the support of management and staff who
can be cross-trained to support critical functions that currently lack resources or redundancy. Figure
13 provides a summary of the communication tasks. Key activities and timing for communication
plan are included in Appendix A – ADH Work Plan.
Figure 13 – ADH-12 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
All Staff • ADH is launching a Town halls, team Kristy Caldwell
new cross-training meetings, and all staff Workforce
program (add program emails. Development
details). Face-to-face leadership Director
• Workforce meetings.
Development will
manage this program
by identifying both
teams with needs and
teams with capacity.
• This program is a way
to provide immediate
relief to high-volume
units to expand their
capacity and prevent
disruption when staff
are at capacity or out
of office.
• This program is a great
way to expand skills
and gain visibility into
other programs at
ADH.
Management • Volunteering to be Kristy Caldwell
cross-trained/ Workforce
volunteering your unit Development
for cross-training is an Director
important
contribution to the
organization’s
success.
• No punitive action will
be taken toward
teams who identify
excess capacity.
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ADH Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Strategic Management Plan:
Arkansas Department of Labor and
Licensing
Table of Contents
Overview ............................................................................................................................... 1
Recommended Organizational Structure .......................................................................... 2
How this Department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective future department ............... 4
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation...................................... 4
ADLL-11: Rationalize agency board structures ....................................................................................... 4
ADLL-02: Restructure ADLL funding to single appropriation............................................................... 12
ADLL-01: Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and efficiency .......................... 18
ADLL-05: Centralize physical location of boards ................................................................................ 25
Overview
Formed in 2019 through Act 910, the Arkansas Department of Labor and Licensing (ADLL) was
created through the consolidation of the legacy Department of Labor, Workers Compensation
Program, and over 20 boards and commissions. ADLL has been steadfast in achieving its mission of
“ensuring fair and safe labor practices, promoting economic growth, and protecting the welfare of
workers and businesses across the state.” A core strategy in achieving this mission is “upholding
standards, promoting education and compliance, and striving for continuous improvement in all
areas of labor and licensing regulation.”
ADLL has worked since its formation to develop the most effective framework for regulation of the
professions under its purview and management of its boards and commissions. Through the
Arkansas Forward project, a 2024 initiative to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of Arkansas’
15 cabinet-level departments, ADLL seeks to continue the work of the 2019 transformation to more
fully integrate its organization and create an improved operating model through consolidation of
applicable boards and commissions. ADLL’s four Arkansas Forward initiatives seek to consolidate
its board structure and align its appropriation, staffing model, and facility footprint with this structure
to improve service to constituents and achieve administrative efficiencies in operating these boards.
This Strategic Management Plan (“Plan”) memorializes the work completed by ADLL during Arkansas
Forward, translating the department’s vision into a plan consisting of recommended organizational
structure, key initiatives prioritized for immediate implementation, and related performance metrics.
ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 1
Recommended Organizational Structure
ADLL’s current organization chart is shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1 – Current Organizational Structure
As part of Arkansas Forward, the project team reviewed ADH’s structure to identify opportunities for
redesign in the following areas:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission: Realignment of
ADLL’s structure of Boards and Commissions (contemplated in ADLL-11) supports ADLL’s
efforts bring value to the public and licensees served by ADLL. Improvements in how ADLL
staffs the Boards and Commissions can improve customer service by simplifying the
licensing process across functions, reducing licensing processing times, and reducing the
overall cost of regulation, which can result in fee reductions.
• Changes identified as part of Arkansas Forward: Initiative ADLL-01 proposes to align
ADLL’s organization structure with its new Boards and Commissions structure. This would
need a change in how ADLL receives its appropriations (ADLL-04) and would require
legislative support. This structure would allow ADLL to staff these Boards and Commissions
efficiently and benefit licensees as noted above.
ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 2
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ move to deliver certain functions through shared
services: Based on direction from the Steering Committee, Transformation and Shared
Services (TSS) will assume responsibility for the Payroll and Help Desk functions statewide,
as the first Human Resources and Information Technology functions to transfer to TSS in a
statewide shared services model. Additional decisions on further functions have not yet
been determined.
Figure 2 provides an organization chart that aligns with ADLL’s preferred model of consolidation.
Other options for the future of ADLL’s organization are detailed in ADLL-01.
Figure 2 – Current Organizational Structure
ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 3
How this department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective
future department
ADLL prioritized initiatives to focus on its operation of boards and commissions – all of its four
initiatives fall within these focus areas. ADLL seeks the regulatory and budgetary flexibility to change
how it operates the boards and commissions so that it can leverage its staff efficiently to address
workload, use cross-training to enable staff to support staff in other areas, and achieve
improvements in how it regulates and oversees these professions (e.g., streamlining licensing
processes). ADLL will also reduce its facilities footprint as part of this effort. Collectively, the goal of
these initiatives is to ensure an efficient administrative structure exists to support the work of the
boards and commissions under ADLL’s purview, and to make these changes in a manner that does
not negatively impact the public, licensees, and stakeholders. ADLL seeks to use the administrative
efficiency and flexibility gained as a result of these efforts to conduct greater process improvement
for areas such as licensing and oversight, which can reduce the cost of regulation and reduced fees.
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward
Implementation
ADLL leadership generated 17 ideas to improve departmental effectiveness and efficiency before
prioritizing 4 initiatives for immediate implementation as part of Arkansas Forward which collectively
focus on improving the organization.
ADLL-11: Consolidate agency board structures
This initiative seeks to simplify agency board structures by consolidating boards for similar trades to
reduce administrative workload and improve license application cycle time.
Initiative Overview and Current State: When the Department of Labor and Licensing was
established in 2019, a significant step was taken to consolidate numerous boards under a single
umbrella. This move aimed to streamline oversight and improve efficiency. However, ADLL has not
yet fully implemented, with each of its 22 boards existing as an independent entity, with a separate
appropriation. Not only does this create a workload challenge, with all Boards reporting to the Chief
of Staff, but ADLL is unable to staff the boards efficiently, share resources as needed to address
workload, leverage efficiencies to create an improved and simplified process for licensees, and
lower the overall costs.
The department oversees a wide range of boards, including those focused on building professionals,
building safety, public accountancy, bail, towing, real estate, workers’ compensation, and
manufactured homes. Current boards overseen by ADLL include:
• AR State Board of Architects, • AR State Board of Licensure for
Landscape Architects, & Interior Professional Engineers & Professional
Designers Surveyors
ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 4
• AR State Board of Registration for • Motor Vehicle Commission
Professional Geologists • AR Athletic Commission
• AR State Board of Public Accountancy • AR State Board of Barber Examiners
• AR Real Estate Commission • Contractor's Licensing Board
• Auctioneer's Licensing Board • Residential Contractors Committee
• State Board of Appraisers, • Board of Electrical Examiners of the
Abstracters, & Home Inspectors State of AR
• AR State Board of Collection Agencies • Elevator Safety Board
• Professional Bail Bondsman Licensing • Fire Protection Licensing Board
Board • HVAC/R Licensing Board
• Towing and Recovery Board Boiler - Not current Board
•
• AR Manufactured Home Commission • Workers Compensation Commission
Rationale: ADLL seeks to implement a consolidated board structure, while streamlining the
administration of these boards. The department has identified two approaches for consolidation to
address the challenges related to the current structure. Both approaches seek to reduce
administrative burden. Both proposals maintain the Workers Compensation Commission as a
freestanding Commission due to its specialized function.
Plan 1: Four Board Approach
This approach merges all boards into four boards (with the Workers Compensation Commission
remaining freestanding as the fourth entity) based on broad function, summarized in Figure 3 below:
• Professional Adjudication Board: Overseeing professions such as accounting, law, and
engineering.
• Industry Adjudication Board: Focusing on industries such as construction, manufacturing,
and transportation.
• Trade Adjudication Board: Regulating trades such as plumbing, electrical work, and HVAC.
Figure 3 – Proposed Four Board Consolidation
Professional Adjudication Industry Adjudication Board Trade Adjudication Board
Board
Arkansas State Board of Arkansas State Board of Residential Contractors
Architects, Landscape Collection Agencies Commission
Architects, and Interior Designers
Arkansas State Board of Professional Bail Bondsman Board of Electrical Examiners of
Licensure for Professional Licensing Board the State of Arkansas
Engineers and Professional
Surveyors
Arkansas State Board of Towing and Recovery Board Elevator Safety Board
Registration for Professional
Geologists
Arkansas State Board of Public Arkansas Manufactured Home Fire Protection Licensing Board
Accountancy Commission
ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 5
Professional Adjudication Industry Adjudication Board Trade Adjudication Board
Board
Arkansas Real Estate Motor Vehicle Commission HVAC/R Licensing Board
Commission
Auctioneer’s Licensing Board Arkansas Athletic Commission Boiler
(Eliminate as a freestanding
Commission, would become
responsibility of Industry
Adjudication Board)
State Board of Appraisers, Arkansas State Board of Barber
Abstractors, and Home Examiners
Inspectors (this group already
has an in-process consolidation)
Notes: The State Board of Barber Examiners could be included with the Professional or Trade Adjudication
Boards and ADLL has not yet determined its recommended board grouping. The Athletic Commission would
be eliminated as a freestanding Commission, but its responsibilities would be taken over by the Industry
Adjudication Board. ADLL has indicated the proposal to eliminate the Commission is based on the fact that the
Commission’s costs of operation have exceeded its revenue collections for several years.
Plan 2: Nine Board Approach
This approach reduces the number of boards from 22 to 9 (again, no change to Workers Compensation
Commission). The proposed boards are outlined in Figure 4 below.
Figure 4 – ADLL Proposed Nine Board Consolidation
Group 1 Group 2 Group 3 Group 4 Group 5 Group 6 Group 7 Group 8
Building Building Public Bail, Real Manufacture Other Labor
Professional Safety Accountanc Towing, Estate/ d Homes & Boards
s y and and Property Motor
Collections Recovery Sales Vehicles
Arkansas Board of Arkansas Professional Arkansas Arkansas State State Board
State Board Electrical State Board Bail Real Estate Manufactured Board of of Barber
of Architects, Examiners of Public Bondsman Commission Home Appraisers, Examiners
Landscape of the Accountancy Licensing Commission Abstractors,
Architects, State of Board and
and Interior Arkansas Home
Designers Inspectors
Arkansas Elevator Arkansas Towing and Auctioneer’s Motor Vehicle Athletic
State Board Safety State Board Recovery Licensing Commission Commission
of Licensure Board of Collection Board Board (Eliminate
for Agencies as
Professional freestanding
Engineers Commission,
and would
Professional become
Surveyors responsibility
of Other
Department
of Labor
Board)
6
ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Group 1 Group 2 Group 3 Group 4 Group 5 Group 6 Group 7 Group 8
Building Building Public Bail, Real Manufacture Other Labor
Professional Safety Accountan Towing, Estate/ d Homes & Boards
s c y and and Property Motor
Collections Recovery Sales Vehicles
Arkansas Fire
State Board Protection
of Licensing
Registration Board
for
Professional
Geologists
Residential HVAC/R
Contractors Licensing
Commission Board
Notes: Boiler – not proposed for consolidation in Plan 2 and the location for the State Board of Barber
Examiners has not yet been identified for consolidation. State Board of Appraisers, Abstracters, & Home
Inspectors is currently merging into one board.
Both plans offer several potential benefits that include:
• Streamlined and improved processes for licensees: Consolidated boards will be able to
share best practices, and review and adopt processes, forms, and approaches to regulation,
which could benefit licensees.
• Increased efficiency: Consolidating boards allows for better coordination among staff,
leading to more efficient use of resources and faster response times, given many instances
in which staff are over- and under-utilized based on the licensing calendar.
• Improved oversight: Grouping similar boards can result in enhanced oversight and
improved decision-making.
• Enhanced collaboration: Merging boards can improve communication and collaboration
among ADLL staff, board members, stakeholders, and the public.
• Greater resource utilization: Pooling resources can lead to more effective use of state funds
and staff expertise.
The degree of consolidation will determine the extent of these benefits. A more significant
consolidation, as envisioned in Plan 1, is likely to yield greater efficiencies and improvements.
However, Plan 1 may be more challenging to implement.
Implementation Considerations:
The State of Iowa recently undertook an initiative to substantially transform its boards and
commissions. This experience can be instructive to Arkansas. In 2023-2024, the State of Iowa
engaged in a comprehensive review of its boards and commissions. This review coincided with
consolidation of the state’s cabinet-level departments. Most of the occupational licensing functions
were consolidated at the Department of Inspections, Appeals, and Licensing (DIAL). Key steps in this
process included:
• Senate Bill 514 (2023) created a Boards & Commissions Review Committee.
7
ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• The Committee issued a final report in September 2023 recommending a reduction of 111
boards and commissions (43%), board members (450 member reduction), and making many
improvements to the administrative functions of DIAL in supporting the boards.
• Senate Bill 2385 (2024) made some consolidations including creating a new board charged
with mental health-related functions but did not result in the significant consolidation
envisioned by the Committee. Many administrative changes did pass. Some of the most
significant changes included amending statutes to permit the use of the licensing fees for the
purpose of all DIAL’s operations (instead of the more limited purpose to support the given
profession’s board) which gave the department the flexibility to operate its boards efficiently
and make other administrative changes including pooling administrative resources and
making assignments based on function not board (i.e., licensing, oversight, board support).
DIAL was able to implement a variety of improvements following SB 2385, including:
• Creation of a single licensing appropriation: By consolidating the licensing funds, Iowa
enabled greater flexibility in administrative funding. This allows for more effective allocation
of resources across various licensing functions, addressing demand fluctuations without
being constrained by department-specific budgets.
• Database consolidation: DIAL is in the process of merging its six legacy licensing system
databases into one, which will greatly simplify the management and oversight of licensing.
• Staffing efficiency: Consolidation allowed for staff cross-training. This adaptability
maximized workforce utilization and enabled departments to meet demands more flexibly.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
In meeting with ADLL leaders, leaders identified some of the risks and challenges to board and
commission consolidation which are summarized in the diagram provided in Figure 6. In this
diagram, the goal of a streamlined structure is shown in blue, and each of the red boxes represents
a challenge or anticipated challenge. The green boxes represent solutions. In summary, the greatest
challenge anticipated relates to change management. See the detailed discussion to follow about
managing the change and engaging stakeholders.
8
ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 6 – Board Consolidation Interference Diagram
Recommended steps for establishing a consolidated board structure:
• Conduct initial assessments to develop a consolidation proposal: Complete
• Review legal and operational considerations for proposal: Complete
• Clarify and define legal restrictions (identifying needed statutory changes): Complete
• Present plan to Secretary Bassett for approval: Complete
• Engage with Arkansas Legislative Council: In process
• Draft necessary statutory changes
• Ensure appropriate transparency and controls.
• Develop a comprehensive Stakeholder Engagement and Communication Plan
• Initiate Stakeholder Engagement and Communication Plan
• Develop a phased plan for data and system integration
Alignment of Department priorities with staffing and resources: ADLL leadership
believes that this initiative is crucial to completing the work intended by the 2019 Transformation
initiative. Today’s board structure results in a siloed approach, with each board performing all of its
own functions (licensing, investigating grievances, preparing for meetings, conducting meetings).
ADLL seeks greater flexibility in how it operates and staffs the boards and commissions, which it
expects will result in a leaner and more efficient model over time.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: The immediate process changes resulting from the consolidation of boards and
commissions will primarily focus on structural adjustments. While the core processes and functions
9
ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
will remain largely unchanged in the short-term, the consolidation will streamline operations and
enhance efficiency and, over time, additional process changes will be possible.
Key initial changes include:
• Reduced number of boards: The consolidation will significantly reduce the number of
governing bodies, leading to fewer meetings, reduced administrative overhead, and improved
coordination.
• Streamlined governance: The consolidated boards will likely adopt a more unified
governance structure, potentially including a central executive committee or board chair.
This will help ensure consistent decision-making and policy implementation.
• Shared resources: Administrative and support staff may be shared across multiple boards,
leading to more efficient use of resources and reduced costs.
Future process changes will evolve over time as:
• Teams collaborate: As the new structure takes effect, teams will have the opportunity to
share best practices and learn from each other.
• Continuous improvement: A culture of continuous improvement will be fostered, leading to
ongoing refinements and optimizations of processes and procedures such as adopting more
unform licensing requirements, use of forms, and systems utilized.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
Reduction in Administrative Burden:
• Number of meetings held annually across all boards and commissions (expected to
decrease);
Improved Efficiency of Oversight:
• Regulatory turnaround time (time to process a license) (expected to decrease);
Cost savings:
• Total administrative costs (expected to decrease across all boards and commissions);
• Total number of administrative staff (not immediately expected to change as a result of the
consolidation but could decrease over time);
• Percent of fees reduced (expect this to increase over time as regulatory costs decrease);
Measures to ensure no unintended consequences of consolidation:
• Number of grievances, by board (this initiative is not expected to change the volume of
grievances, but it is important to monitor that the number of grievances does not increase).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: To prevent double-counting of anticipated fiscal impacts, the staffing and
budgetary impacts of board consolidation are discussed in greater detail in ADLL-01 and ADLL-04.
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Change Management Plan: Effective change management for the consolidation of boards at
ADLL requires early, open conversations with key stakeholders. By initiating open dialogue with
legislators, staff, and the public, the department can ensure a smooth transition and minimize issues
for its stakeholders. Fostering open communication and proactively addressing concerns will help
build trust and support for the consolidation process.
• Obtaining legislative support: Initiate early dialogue with key legislators to outline the
benefits of consolidation and address potential concerns. Emphasize how the consolidation
will improve efficiency, reduce costs, and ultimately benefit all stakeholders, including
legislators and their constituents.
• Addressing staff concerns: Conduct one-on-one conversations with impacted employees
to address concerns and provide reassurance that they have a role in the new structure.
Highlight potential benefits such as reduced workload, increased support during peak
demand, and opportunities for career growth.
• Addressing stakeholder, board member, and public concerns: Establish a public process
to obtain feedback and engage stakeholders around the purpose for the change, controls
being implemented, and anticipated benefits of consolidation, such as cost savings and
improved efficiency. This includes the need to engage in dialogue with associations to
address their concerns and gain their support.
To address these unique stakeholder groups, it is recommended that ADLL develop a comprehensive
communication plan in collaboration with the Office of the Governor. Figure 7 summarizes high level
communication tasks, that are also included in Appendix A – ADLL Work Plan.
Figure 7 – ADLL-11 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Legislative ● Realigning ADLL’s board structure, ● Meetings ● Secretary Bassett
Stakeholders appropriation, and staffing model with ● Steve Guntharp
will allow the department to improve Legislative
the efficiency of state government leadership
● This realignment will support
process improvement and efficient
oversight of the Boards, which will
benefit stakeholders and the public
● This approach is will free up
approximately $3.6 million in
General Revenue
● This approach is also expected to
result in cost savings over time from
more efficient use of staff and
reduced regulatory costs
● Savings from reduced regulatory
costs can be passed on to the public
and licensees through reduced fees
11
ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Board Members ● ADLL has created groupings based ● Meetings ● Secretary Bassett
and on policy reasons and to allow for a with each ● Steve Guntharp
Stakeholders balancing of workload board
● ADLL will maintain adequate ● Public
resources to support each Board and meetings to
Commission obtain
● The new appropriations and feedback on
organizational structure will allow proposal
ADLL to staff and Boards and
Commissions better, including
managing seasonal workload
fluctuations
● The new organization structure will
support process improvement
including efforts to streamline the
licensure process
ADLL Staff ● ADLL is excited to develop a new ● Staff ● Secretary Bassett
(impacted by the approach to operating the many meetings ● Steve Guntharp
consolidation) boards and commissions under (face-to-
ADLL’s purview face)
● This will result in staffing changes
● This approach will allow for greater
cross-training and support for all
Boards, while providing employees
opportunities for professional
development and growth, through
cross-training
ADLL-02: Restructure ADLL funding to single appropriation
This initiative restructures ADLL’s appropriation to a single appropriation to enable strategic budget
management across divisions and improve organizational effectiveness and the ability to develop
and execute strategic priorities to advance the department’s mission. Note that this initiative
excludes the Workers Compensation program, which has its own appropriation bill and would remain
separate from the proposed single ADLL appropriation.
This initiative will help ADLL to realize the benefits and efficiencies related to three other initiatives
related to boards and commissions, by offering ADLL greater flexibility to redeploy resources based
on a single appropriation (see ADLL-11, which would restructure the department’s boards and
commissions; ADLL-04, which aligns ADLL’s workforce to the new organization structure; and ADLL-
05, which consolidates the physical locations of the boards to reduce rent expenditures). However,
even if the Legislature does not move forward to consolidate boards and commissions under ADLL’s
authority, there is still benefit from consolidating the department’s appropriation.
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADLL has three appropriations bills (Workers
Compensation, legacy Department of Labor programs and boards, and one for multiple boards and
commissions). Including Workers Compensation, ADLL currently oversees 22 boards and
commissions, with the Executive Director of each board reporting to the Chief of Staff. Most of the
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
boards and commissions receive a separate appropriation, which are contained in two
appropriations bills (Act 147, 2024 and Act 10, 2024). Many of the boards receive appropriations from
dedicated funds, as shown in Figure 8 (e.g., State Board of Appraisers, Abstracters, and Home
Inspectors is funded from Arkansas Abstracters' Board Fund). There are no provisions in ADLL’s
budget bills that allow for transfer between the funds or for ADLL to apply fund balances toward its
general operations. Some boards have the authority to add part-time and temporary staff within
appropriated funds when necessary.
Figure 8 – Boards and Commissions, by Method of Finance
Board and Commission Method of Finance 2024
Appropriation
Source
Arkansas Board of Accountancy Cash Fund Act 147
Appraisers, Abstracters and Home Arkansas Abstracters' Board Fund Act 147
Inspection Board Arkansas Home Inspectors Registration
Fund
Cash Fund
Federal Funds
Arkansas State Board of Architects, Cash Fund Act 147
Landscape Architect and Interior Design
Arkansas Athletic Commission Arkansas Athletic Commission Fund Act 147
Cash Fund
Auctioneers Licensing Board Cash Fund Act 147
Professional Bail Bondman Licensing Bail Bondsman Board Fund Act 147
Board Bail Bond Recovery Fund
Cash Fund
Arkansas State Board of Barber Examiners Cash Funds Act 147
Contractors Licensing Board Cash Funds Act 147
State Board of Collection Agencies Cash Funds Act 147
State Bd of Licensure for Professional Cash Funds Act 147
Engineers and Professional Surveyors
Board of Registration for Professional Cash Funds Act 147
Geologists
Arkansas Real Estate Commission Cash Fund Act 147
Arkansas Towing and Recovery Board Cash Fund Act 147
Fire Protection Licensing Board Fire Protection Licensing Fund Act 147
Arkansas Manufactured Home Manufactured Home Standards Fund, Act 147
Commission
Motor Vehicle Commission Motor Vehicle Commission Fund Act 147
Automotive Technologist Education Grant
Fund
HVAC Licensing Board Heating, Ventilation, Air Conditioning and Act 147
Refrigeration Fund
Board of Electrical Examiners Department of Labor and Licensing Special Act 10
Fund
Source: Act 147 and Act 10.
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Note: The Amusement Ride Safety Advisory Board does not receive an appropriation. The State Mediator and
Elevator Safety Board do not receive line item appropriations; they are included in the legacy Department of
Labor appropriations bill (Act 10).
Historically, the rationale for this structure is that licensing fees are to be set at an appropriate level
to cover regulatory costs and the fee revenue is meant to be applied toward regulation of a specific
profession of its staff and board. These fees are established in statute and dedicated for certain
purposes. For example, AR Code § 19-6-415 specifies that: “The Arkansas Abstracters' Board Fund
shall consist of those special revenues as specified in § 19-6-301(93), there to be used for the
maintenance, operation, and improvement of the State Board of Appraisers, Abstracters, and Home
Inspectors.” A listing of all special revenues can be found in AR Code § 19-6-301.
The current budget structure is unsustainable for all Boards and Commission, as some fund
balances are decreasing over time due to reductions in collected fees, which require or will require
subsidization from general revenue (cash funds) (the clearest example being the Arkansas Athletic
Commission). Conversely, some boards have accumulated significant fund balances in excess of
the appropriation need, which cannot otherwise be spent (with examples including the Arkansas
State Board of Architects, Landscape Architects, and Interior Design, and the Motor Vehicle
Commission).
ADLL lacks the budgetary flexibility needed to manage its boards and commissions effectively. The
level of workload varies by board and fluctuates throughout the year (linked to the licensing
calendar). Figure 9 illustrates the timing of licensure applications, which reflect periods of increased
workload during the renewal and late fee periods. Because ADLL cannot shift staff or funds to
support increased workload, the department must independently staff each board, resulting in a
higher total staffing level than might be needed based on volume. At any given point in the year, there
are under-utilized and over-utilized staff.
Figure 9 – Licensing Renewal and Late Periods, by Date
Licensing Area Renewal Period Late Fee Period
State Board of Accountancy November-December January-March
Professional Engineers November-June July-up to 2 years
Professional Surveyors May-December January-up to 2 years
Dual (Engineer and Surveyor) August-March April-up to 2 years
Professional Geologists May-June July-December
Barbers July-September 1st October-up to 3 years
Real Estate Commission July 15-Sept 30 October-December
Real Estate Schools/Instructors Feb 1st-March 31st April
Athletic Commission (All Licenses) May-June N/A
HVACR (All Licenses) Year Round (Annual) Day after Expiration up to 3 years
Contractors (All Licenses) Year Round (Annual) Day after Expiration up to 2 years
Electrical Licenses (All Licenses) Year Round (Annual) Day after Expiration up to 3 years
Fire Protection Licensing and Permits May-June July-up to 2 years
Portable Extinguishers August-Sept October-up to 2 years
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Licensing Area Renewal Period Late Fee Period
Elevator Inspection and Permits Year Round (Annual) N/A
Elevator Mechanics/Inspectors December N/A
Appraiser (In State Appraisers) May-June July-December
Appraiser Trainees November-December January-June
Motor Vehicle Commission (Dealers, Lessors) November-December January-June
Motor Vehicle Commission (Distributors, Mfgs) July August-December
Auctioneer’s July-October November-December
Professional Bail Bondsman/ Companies October-November December 2nd-December 31st
Towing and Recovery Year Around (Annual) N/A
Collection Agencies April-June N/A
Abstracters May-July 1st N/A
Architects July August 1st- up to 3 years
Landscape, and Interior Designers January February 1st- up to 3 years
Home Inspectors November-December January-June
Manufactured Home Commission Year Round (Annual) Up to 45 days after expiration
Boiler Inspectors May-June N/A
Boiler Operators Year Round (Annual) N/A
Source: ADLL
Rationale: Creation of a single appropriation for ADLL (excluding Workers Compensation) would
give the department the flexibility to administer board activities more efficiently and enable further
improvements and cost savings to be realized. The consolidated appropriation would allow ADLL to
pool administrative staff resources to support multiple boards or to reorganize based on functional
responsibilities (i.e., licensing, oversight) instead of by board. This model would result in improved
utilization of staff resources, allowing additional staff to support increased volume around peak
licensure time periods and improve management of workload.
Over time, improvements in how ADLL supports its boards are expected to reduce the cost of
regulation by decreasing the number of full-time staff required to staff the boards. As the cost of
regulation decreases, ADLL can pass these savings on to the professions it regulates in the form of
fee reductions.
In addition, appropriating fee revenue to the department in a single appropriation and passage of
enabling legislation to allow fee revenue to support all ADLL activities instead of restricted to each
board. This would enable board oversight activities to be funded solely through fee revenue,
eliminating the need for a general revenue (cash) appropriation of approximately $3.5 million
annually. This appropriation could be in turn be used to support other budgetary priorities for the
state. ADLL would continue to require approximately $400,000 in general revenue to maintain the
state share match required by the department’s federal grants.
Implementation Considerations:
As noted, the state of Iowa provides a recent example of a state that sought to streamline its boards
and commissions. In 2023-2024, Iowa engaged in a comprehensive review of its boards and
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
commissions. This review coincided with consolidation of the state’s cabinet-level departments.
Most of the occupational licensing functions were consolidated at the Department of Inspections,
Appeals, and Licensing (DIAL). Senate Bill 514 (2023) created a Boards & Commissions Review
Committee. The Committee issued a final report in September 2023 recommending a reduction of
111 boards and commissions (43%), board members (450 member reduction), and making many
modernizations and improvements to the administrative functions of DIAL in supporting the boards.
While the final legislation (SB 2385) did not result in the significant consolidation envisioned by the
Committee, some of the administrative improvements did pass. Some of the most significant
changes included amending statutes to permit the use of the licensing fees for the purpose of all
DIAL’s operations (instead of the more limited purpose to support the given profession’s board) which
gave the department the flexibility to operate its boards efficiently and make other administrative
changes including pooling administrative resources and making assignments based on function not
board (i.e., licensing, oversight, board support). Arkansas may wish to follow all or parts of the Iowa
model.
Appendix A – ADLL Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with ADL staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Complete a statutory review of changes required to support a single appropriation
(complete).
• Provide early outreach to Legislative leaders and outline in a clear manner the benefits to the
State, its taxpayers, stakeholders, and ADLL:
o Develop a fiscal impact analysis that shows cost neutrality within the department,
freeing up of general revenue.
o Develop a plan to use administrative cost reduction to decrease fee revenue over
time.
o Develop outreach materials designed to educate legislators about how this authority
will help ADLL operate more effectively, reduce administrative costs over time, and
share cost savings with the public through reduced fees.
Recommended steps for establishing a single appropriation for ADLL (future state):
• Engage the Department of Finance and Administration (DFA) to review and refine proposal.
• Review and verify financial systems capacity to properly account for and report budget to
actual performance and financial statements to align with a consolidated appropriations act.
• Document business cases on how consolidated appropriations will support administrative
efficiency; align funding to new organization structure and demonstrate reduced cost of
regulation over time (to support fee reduction proposal).
• Meet with Legislative leaders from both Houses to develop support, outline the ADLL
roadmap for implementation, including strategies to address specific legislative concerns.
Discuss business case. Share information about Iowa’s streamlining of boards and
commissions with Legislative leaders.
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Work with group of key Legislators and the Office of Legislative and Intergovernmental Affairs
to draft legislation that would consolidate appropriations and modify statutory requirements
for the use of dedicated licensing fees.
• Receive Executive approval before moving forward.
• Engage stakeholders in review of proposed appropriation language and share Business Case.
• Ensure that the legislation has the appropriate transparency and organizational controls.
• Establish the required financial controls.
• Develop a fiscal impact statement including analysis that demonstrates the cost neutrality
or long-term savings for any such legislation.
• Pass required statutory changes to support single appropriation.
• Pass budget under the new appropriation structure.
These proposed steps assume a time period of approximately three months to prepare
documentation and meet with Legislative officials (including Legislative Council) to identify
champions, build support, and file legislation. This time period also assumes upfront engagement of
interested stakeholders.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This single
appropriation initiative aligns with ADLL’s related initiatives to improve the functioning of its boards
and commissions. This initiative is expected to support the change in how ADLL staffs its boards and
commissions, enabling administrative staff to be pooled across boards or to support specialization
by function (i.e., licensing).
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
The shift to a single appropriation will change departmental budget processes and position
management, impacting how ADLL engages DFA and the Office of Personnel Management.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: This initiative is
expected to result in greater flexibility to transfer funds and resources to administer boards.
Success could be measured by monitoring:
• Administrative costs (expected to decrease over time)
• Total staff supporting Boards and Commissions (expected to decrease over time)
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: This initiative will lead to more efficient and effective management of
ADLL’s scarce resources across all boards and will also serve to enable ADLL to pool resources and
reduce or eliminate the over/under utilization of staff. The pooling of funds will enable ADLL to share
funds across boards, using surpluses to fund deficits and eliminating the need for a general revenue
(cash) appropriation of approximately $3.5 million annually. This appropriation could be in turn be
used to support other budgetary priorities for the state. ADLL would continue to require
approximately $400,000 in general revenue to maintain the state share match required by the
department’s federal grants. A complete fiscal analysis will be conducted by ADLL once preliminary
approval is received for this initiative. ADLL will then implement proper fiscal controls to monitor any
future transfer and activities under this single appropriation..
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Change Management Plan: ADLL will need to ensure additional fiscal controls are in place. A
model will need to be created to demonstrate fiscal neutrality (total funding per board not changing
despite method of finance change) and a plan to reduce share staff resources among boards and
reduce administrative expenses over time (returning some revenue back to the public through fee
reductions). Figure 10 summarizes communication tasks that are also included in Appendix A –
ADLL Work Plan.
Figure 10 – ADLL-02 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Legislative ● Single Appropriation will enable ● Meetings ● Steve Guntharp
Stakeholders more effective administration with ● Tyler Cain
of boards and commission Legislative
● This appropriation will reduce leadership
the need for general
revenue/cash and free up
approximately $3.5 million per
year for other purposes
● More efficient staffing of the
boards will decrease regulatory
costs and allow savings to be
shared with the public in the
form of fee reductions
Board Staff and ● Single appropriation will enable ● Staff ● Steve Guntharp
Members more effective management of bulletins ● Tyler Cain
boards ● Staff emails
● Ability to transfer fund and staff ● All staff
will allow ADLL to respond to meetings
fluctuations in workload and
use cross-trained staff to
balance workload
Stakeholders ● Single appropriation will enable ● Stakeholder ● Steve Guntharp
more effective management of email lists ● Tyler Cain
boards ● Stakeholder
● More efficient staffing of the forum
boards will decrease regulatory
costs and allow savings to be
shared with the public in the
form of fee reductions
ADLL-01: Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and
efficiency
This initiative is part of the broader Arkansas Forward Agile Organization initiative and includes
implementing a tailored and modernized organization to ensure effective distribution of
management responsibilities, enhanced operational efficiency, and improved role clarity among
managerial positions.
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADLL’s current organization structure is directly
related to its current Board and Commission structure. The department’s appropriations bills
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
(Workers Compensation, legacy Department of Labor programs and Boards, and one for multiple
Boards and Commission) provide the staff count for each Board and Commission, with the director
of each reporting to the Chief of Staff (shown in Figure 11). This structure creates a large span of
control for the Chief of Staff and contributes to the “siloed” approach to staffing each Board or
Commission, where each Board or Commission has a lead and support staff. Staff are only able to
support their designated Board or Commission and are not able to support multiple Boards and
Commissions. This is based on the appropriations acts, which mandate that staff be soley
committed to their specific organization and in many cases, fund the position out of dedicated funds.
As noted in ADLL-02, ADLL lacks the flexibility needed to manage its boards and commissions
effectively. Workload of the Boards and Commissions fluctuates throughout the year, with periods of
increased workload corresponding to license renewal periods. Because ADLL cannot shift staff or
funds to support increased workload, the department must staff each board, resulting in a higher
total staffing level than might be needed based on the volume of work. At any given point in the year,
there are under-utilized and over-utilized staff under the current structure.
Figure 11 – ADLL Current Organization Chart
Rationale: ADLL seeks to align its organization structure with its proposals to consolidate its
boards. Figure 12 shows the proposed chart if the Plan 1 Four Board Model is used. This approach
would create a team under each of the three new organizations (excluding Workers Compensation).
In this model, an existing Managing Attorney position is elevated to oversee the boards and
commissions and creates a layer between the Chief of Staff and the Boards. For each of the three
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
new boards, there is a team lead (elevated from one of the current directors) and a pooled support
staff. Each director would continue to be the subject matter lead for their functional area.
Figure 12 – ADLL Future Organization Chart, Four Board Model
Figure 13 provides an alternate model if the nine board model is chosen. Under this model, the only
difference from the four board model is that there are more team leads identified.
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 13 – ADLL Future Organization Chart, Nine Board Model
Should the Legislature not move forward with board and commission consolidation, ADLL seeks to
gain a single appropriation with ability to staff the boards using a pooled administrative staff
approach. Under this model, administrative efficiencies would be achieved in how ADLL supports
the Boards and Commissions, without impacting stakeholders. In this approach, a pooled
administrative team would be created to support all boards and commissions, while the directors
would remain dedicated to their current board or commission (see Figure 14). This would allow the
Department to assign staff to functional areas instead of individual boards, which would prevent the
over/under utilization of staff and allow for cross-training, process improvement. Over time, the
pooled approach should also allow ADLL to reduce of the overall number of staff needed to perform
the work.
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 14 – ADLL Future Organization Chart, Administrative Consolidation Only
Implementation Considerations:
As noted, the State of Iowa provides a recent example of a state that sought to streamline its boards
and commissions. In Iowa the Department of Inspections, Appeals, and Licensing (DIAL) gained
flexibility in SB 2385 to use licensing fees for the purpose of all DIAL’s operations (instead of the more
limited purpose to support the given profession’s board). This gave the department the flexibility to
operate its boards efficiently and make other administrative changes including pooling
administrative resources and making staff assignments based on function not board (i.e., licensing,
oversight, board support). This structural change enabled the department to begin implementing
initiatives to streamline licensing such as moving to a new single licensing platform and adopting
more universal licensing process (for example using a common form). These process changes also
supported staff cross-training so that staff could more easily process licenses across functions
instead of the Boards or Commissions to which they were previously assigned.
Appendix A – ADLL Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with ADLL staff.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
Organizational realignment will require a change in how ADLL receives its appropriation (i.e., a
consolidated appropriation for the purpose of ADLL’s operational functions). Statutory changes may
be required related to the use of licensing fees/dedicated funds. This will require engaging the
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Legislature to demonstrate the benefits of the approach. As detailed in ADLL-02, mitigating these
risks will require early outreach to Legislative leaders and clearly articulating the benefits to the state,
its taxpayers, stakeholders, and ADLL. Risk mitigation steps include:
• Develop a plan to show how critical staff will be retained to ensure expertise in each area.
• Demonstrate how administrative staff will be cross-trained to support other areas and how
functional organization can support the department better than having separate teams for
each board.
• Develop outreach materials designed to educate legislators about how this authority will
help ADLL operate more effectively, reduce administrative costs over time, foster program
improvement, and share cost savings with the public through reduced fees.
Depending on which organizational model is ultimately chosen, there may be differing levels of
concerns from Board and Commission members, stakeholders, and staff. ADLL will need to manage
change proactively with these organizations and use a variety of public forums to explain the purpose
of these changes and obtain feedback. Communicating that ADLL will staff each board appropriately,
will retain a dedicated director to handle grievances and oversight issues, and ensuring appropriate
expertise is retained on the consolidated boards and commissions will be key messages included in
this strategy.
Recommended steps for establishing new organization structure (future state):
• Document business cases on how consolidated appropriations and realignment of staffing
will support administrative efficiency; align funding to new organization structure and
demonstrate reduced cost of regulation over time (to support fee reduction proposal).
• Meet with Legislative leaders from both Houses to develop support, outline the ADLL
roadmap for implementation, including strategies to address specific legislative concerns.
Discuss business case.
• Receive Executive approval before moving forward.
• Develop comprehensive Stakeholder Engagement Strategy.
• Engage stakeholders in review of proposed reorganization and share Business Case.
• Ensure that the legislation has the appropriate transparency and organizational controls.
• Pass required statutory changes to support single appropriation.
• Pass budget under the new appropriation structure.
• Coordinate with Human Resources to begin implementation of approved organization chart
changes.
• Encourage each new team to map operational processes and consider process
improvements enabled by the new organization structure, with a focus on improving the
licensure process.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: The ability to realign
staff efficiently to support its boards and commissions is one of the primary purposes for ADLL’s
proposal to consolidate its boards and commissions. This initiative is anticipated to allow ADLL to
leverage its staff efficiently, enabling administrative staff to be pooled across boards or to support
specialization by function (i.e., licensing). It is assumed that some of the existing staff directors would
be elevated to a “lead” position to oversee a group of boards, but that this would be done within
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
existing resources in the short-term. ADLL may seek to upgrade these position classifications over
time.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
Organization realignment is anticipated to provide the conditions for process improvement. When
staff collaborate, they will share best practices across the many functions performed such as
licensing, board support, regulation, oversight of grievances. Consolidated teams may be able to
implement more standardized and streamlined processes for functional areas such as licensing. It
is recommended that the newly formed teams use process mapping to collaborate to develop their
new standard operating procedures moving forward.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: This initiative is
expected to result in greater flexibility to pool resources and align the organization structure to
consolidate boards.
Success could be measured by monitoring:
• Administrative costs (expected to decrease over time); and,
• Total staff supporting Boards and Commissions (expected to decrease over time).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: This initiative will lead to more efficient and effective management of
ADLL’s administrative resources by allowing ADLL to leverage its staff efficiently, enabling
administrative staff to be pooled across boards or to support specialization by function (i.e.,
licensing). It will also allow staff to be cross-trained to support the work of other Boards and/or
alignment of staff by function instead of Board/Commission.
Change Management Plan: Depending on the staffing model chosen, ADLL may encounter
challenges from stakeholders, existing Boards and Commission members, the Legislature, and the
public. Clear and frequent communication and stakeholder engagement will be required throughout
the Board and Commission consolidation process, especially when making organizational changes.
It is recommended that ADLL develop a comprehensive communication plan in collaboration with
the Office of the Governor. Figure 15 summarizes high level communication tasks, that are also
included in Appendix A – ADLL Work Plan.
Figure 15 – ADLL-01 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Legislative ● Realigning ADLL’s organization ● Meetings ● Secretary Bassett
Stakeholders structure will allow the with ● Steve Guntharp
department to realize the Legislative
benefits of Board and leadership
Commission consolidation
● This realignment will support
process improvement and
efficient oversight of the
Boards, which will benefit
stakeholders and the public
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
● This approach is expected to
result in cost savings over time
from more efficient use of staff
● Savings from reduced
regulatory costs can be passed
on to the public and licensees
through reduced fees
Board Members and ● ADLL will maintain adequate ● Meetings ● Secretary Bassett
Stakeholders resources to support each with each ● Steve Guntharp
Board and Commission board
● The new organizational ● Public
structure will allow ADLL to meetings to
staff and Boards and obtain
Commissions better, including feedback on
managing seasonal workload proposal
fluctuations
● The new organization structure
will support process
improvement including efforts
to streamline the licensure
process
ADLL Staff (impacted ● ADLL is excited to develop a ● Staff ● Secretary Bassett
by the consolidation) new approach to staffing and meetings ● Steve Guntharp
managing the important board (face-to-
functions for which it is face)
responsible
● This approach will allow for
greater cross-training and
support for all Boards, while
providing employees
opportunities for professional
development and growth,
through cross-training
ADLL-05: Centralize physical location of boards
This initiative directs ADLL to relocate the three remaining agency boards (Board of Contractors,
Board of Engineers, and Board of Real Estate) that are not located in the main building to enable more
efficient coordination and management.
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADLL maintains 22 boards and commissions within
its purview; and over time has been able to consolidate the physical location of its boards into its
departmental headquarters, which supports staff collaboration and administrative efficiencies.
However, three boards and commissions remain outside this location: the Arkansas Contractors
Licensing Board on Richards Road in North Little Rock, the Arkansas Real Estate Commission on
Summit Street in Little Rock, and the Arkansas State Board of Licensure for Professional Engineers
and Surveyors on Woodlane Street in Little Rock. There are approximately forty employees working
in these locations. Each has their own management team, equipment and supply storage. These
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
three Boards and Commissions own their own properties and the annual operating costs for these
properties are approximately $120,000.
Rationale: ADLL has a need to physically relocate these boards/commissions into one location.
ADLL will evaluate the space at 900 W. Capital Avenue to determine if the footprint can absorb
additional staff (it is anticipated this will be the case). The primary reason for this initiative is to
improve efficiency, allowing the boards to share resources such as a common board room, and
better management and oversight over the boards, which improves quality of operations. On the
occasional instance when members of the public may need to interact with multiple boards,
consolidating these locations has the potential to improve the department’s customer experience.
Consolidation will eliminate the $120,000 annual operating cost for these properties. Additionally,
because the Boards own the locations noted above, ADLL could sell the property at the locations
where the Boards are currently operating, which would result in a revenue gain for the department.
Implementation Considerations: ADLL should consider the following when consolidating
offices:
First, some external stakeholders who interact with one or more boards may initially be concerned
about the office move. Even though the number of employees is relatively small, effective
communication at the outset of the implementation can help to address concerns. Secondly, ADLL
should consider the staff who need to be relocated. Physical separation, as indicated above, created
different office cultures among offices. A change management plan must take into consideration the
cultures of the offices that are being moved, for example, whether an office is family-oriented, holds
employee events, or what needs might exist for privacy/confidentiality in different offices.
ADLL will need to consider the resources necessary to successfully implement this move. Building
out the future space (e.g., office space footprint, copying machines, paper storage, and security to
name a few) must also be considered. Additionally, collaboration with the Division of Building
Authority (DBA) can help ensure a successful implementation. Finally, obtaining buy-in from the
Governor’s Office, appropriate state agencies, and the legislature will enable support of this initiative
and its success.
Appendix A – ADLL Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with ADLL staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• There are a variety of logistics that will be required to manage the moves. A dedicated project
manager to work with DBA and the impacted boards is needed to support this project.
• Communication and change management for staff will be important to mitigate any
opposition. Some staff may be impacted by the move positively and negatively, depending on
the impact to their personal commutes.
• During the move, business continuity for the impacted boards and commissions must be
maintained. This can be mitigated by planning the move in phased rollouts to minimize
effects, ensuring continuous support and clear guidelines for business operations during
each phase.
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Recommended steps for reducing ADLL’s real estate footprint through board consolidation:
• Engage the Arkansas Division of Building Administration (DBA) through ongoing meetings to
implement ADLL’s desired real estate change.
• Develop a plan with recommendations for building consolidation and timeline.
o Develop cost analysis of building consolidation, including total estimated annual
savings including rent, utilities, shared service equipment like copying machines.
• Present the plan to Secretary Bassett for approval and feedback.
• Work with Arkansas Legislative Council to draft necessary statutory changes and ensure
appropriate transparency and controls within the new organization.
• Design a multi-tiered communication plan that addresses different stakeholder groups,
ensuring tailored messages that resonate with each group’s concerns and roles.
• Develop a project plan and designate a project manager to oversee the moves.
• Take inventory of equipment and paper storage needs.
• Engage DBA Design Review for construction drawings for permanent wall improvements,
space design for pricing.
• Develop business continuity plan.
• Implement Communications Plan: make department announcements about
consolidation/offices moves; tout benefits.
• Engage furniture installer to confirm product availability and schedule modifications.
• Meet DBA Maintenance Manager and on-call architects at affected sites to discuss
improvements and tentative schedule for construction estimating and start.
• Develop and evaluate seating arrangement options and product availability/purchases;
make purchases according to final decisions.
• Phased rollout: Complete construction/renovation of building modifications.
• Arrange with Corrections to transport equipment and supplies.
• Launch a pilot phase to test the first phase consolidations, followed by full-scale
implementation.
• Monitor pilot phases to collect feedback on how well consolidations have gone, paying
special attention to workflow disruptions and employee feedback.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative seeks
to improve the collaboration among the Boards and Commissions overseen by ADLL through
physical co-location. This will also support sharing of administrative resources and staff and
contribute to reduced costs of regulation, which can be shared with licensees in the future in the
form of lower fees.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: Change management will be required to implement this initiative, including developing
communication plans for impacted staff and other stakeholders. Policies, protocols, and checklists
for co-location and business continuity also need to be developed. Policies developed for
consolidated office space will need to consider employee feedback.
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to improve management, board efficiencies, improve customer
experience, and realize savings.
The recommend performance measure includes:
• Reduced rent cost (average cost per square foot).
• Employee satisfaction (from employees directly impacted by the moves).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: Based on initial estimates, ADLL has the potential annual reoccurring
financial impact of $120,000, which includes cost savings from the operating costs of these
properties. There could be a future revenue gain to the department if the three impacted Boards and
Commissions are able to sell their properties.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration across state agencies, state leadership, and with
community stakeholders is critical to this initiative. Recommended messaging and modalities are
included for each audience in Figure 16.
Figure 16 – ADLL-05 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Affected staff • Benefits of the • Departmental emails Steve Guntharp
consolidate real • ADLL staff meetings
estate management • Virtual meetings or
approach, showing roadshow
the value of co-
locating,
consolidating space.
• Detailed timeline of
moves and
instructions for their
packing and moving
Community stakeholders • Demonstrate how co- • Individual meetings Steve Guntharp
location and creating on a regular basis
more centralized • Emails
government
functions can help
improve customer
experience and
reduce the cost,
which can result in
lower regulatory fees
• Will involve early on
in process and make
aware of planned
changes early on
Public • Communication of • Website updates Steve Guntharp
new office locations
for public-facing
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
facilities should • Press release in
occur in advance and affected
following the moves communities
• The goal of the
location is to create
benefits to the public
related to co-
location, such as
reduced fees from
reduced regulatory
costs
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ADLL Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Strategic Management Plan:
Arkansas Department of Veterans Affairs
Table of Contents
Overview .............................................................................................................................. 1
Recommended Organizational Structure .......................................................................... 2
How this Department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective future department .......................... 4
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation...................................... 5
ADVA-01: Build a standardized onboarding and compliance curriculum ........................................... 5
ADVA-02: Upskilling County and District VSOs .................................................................................... 11
ADVA-03: Modify recruitment practices to sustainably staff veteran cemeteries ............................ 15
ADVA-05: Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and efficiency ......................... 22
ADVA-06: Focus on talent targeting and broadening career paths for nurses and CNAs in veteran
homes ..................................................................................................................................................... 23
ADVA-07: Increase Public Knowledge of Benefits for Veterans.......................................................... 30
Overview
In 1923, the Arkansas General Assembly created the Arkansas Department of Veterans’ Affairs
(ADVA) to connect veterans and their dependents to state and federal services. ADVA’s mission is to
serve veterans and their eligible dependents through advocacy, education and connection to state
and federal benefits. The vision of the ADVA is to “be the state’s leading advocate and resource
responsive to the changing needs of Veterans and their families in attaining the highest quality of life.”
ADVA administers:
• Two state Veteran cemeteries;
• Two state Veteran nursing homes; and,
• Veteran Services Officer (VSO) network.
Through the Arkansas Forward project, a 2024 effort to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of
Arkansas’ 15 cabinet-level departments, ADVA realigned its organizational structure to strengthen its
ability to perform core roles and responsibilities and prioritized implementation of six initiatives
including five that focus on the organization and its most pressing workforce needs and one related
to improved service delivery to the state’s veterans.
This Strategic Management Plan (“Plan”) memorializes the work completed by ADVA during Arkansas
Forward, translating the department’s vision into a plan consisting of recommended organizational
structure, key initiatives prioritized for immediate implementation, and related performance metrics.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
A companion project plan (“Work Plan”) provides a more detailed resource to support
implementation of the initiatives by ADVA’s Arkansas Forward project management team.
Recommended Organizational Structure
ADVA’s current organization chart is shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1 – Current Organizational Structure
As part of Arkansas Forward, ADVA’s structure was reviewed to identify opportunities for redesign in
three areas:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission;
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives; and,
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions (i.e.,
information technology, human resources, procurement).
As part of Arkansas Forward, ADVA undertook a review of each division’s organization to identify
opportunities to create a more agile organization, considering span of control, number of managerial
layers, opportunities for internal shared services consolidation, and repurposing of existing
positions, among other factors. The needs of each division were distinct, based on the specialized
mission of the organization and a variety of statutory and external constraints.
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission: No additional
changes were identified.
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives: As part of
Initiative ADVA-5, to create the most agile and efficient organization, ADVA identified
opportunities to address some span of control issues within the Veterans’ Service Officer
organization by consolidating business functions.
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions:
Based on direction from the Steering Committee, Transformation and Shared Services (TSS)
will assume responsibility for the Payroll and Help Desk functions statewide, as the first
Human Resources and Information Technology functions to transfer to TSS in a statewide
shared services model. Additional decisions on sequencing of further functions have not yet
been determined.
Recommendations for ADVA’s future state organization are included in Figure 2. The box in green
shows the consolidation of the division’s operational functions under an Assistant Director position,
to include the functions of administration, quality assurance, and business operations.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 2 – Current Organizational Structure
How this Department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective future
department
ADVA prioritized initiatives to focus on its organization and staffing – five of the six total initiatives fall
within these topics. In particular, addressing the critical staffing needs in the veterans cemeteries
and veterans homes is essential to helping the department to meet its vision of an efficient and
effective organization. Reducing vacancies and use of contracted staff is cost-effective and will
enhance services available through the department.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward
Implementation
ADVA leadership generated ten ideas to improve departmental effectiveness and efficiency, before
prioritizing six initiatives for immediate implementation as part of Arkansas Forward which
collectively focus on improving the organization.
ADVA-01: Build a standardized onboarding and compliance curriculum
This initiative seeks to improve the onboarding and compliance practices for ADVA staff. ADVA
Human Resources (HR) will create protocols that improve departmental and organizational
efficiency to better deliver services to veterans. Through a clearly defined action plan, standardized
training objectives will be created and used to better prepare staff for their job roles. The Veterans’
Services Division aims to implement this initiative in alignment with the identification of areas
needed to build long-term talent systems.
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADVA’s workforce includes 305 authorized positions,
organized into three programmatic divisions (veterans’ cemeteries, veterans’ nursing homes, and
veterans’ services network), as well as shared services. As of September 26, 2024, 130 positions are
filled (42.6%) and 175 positions are vacant, with 145 of these vacant positions allocated for direct
care positions such as Registered Nurses (RN), Licensed Practical Nurse (LPN), Certified Nursing
Assistant (CNA) and Licensed Social Workers (LSW). Last year, ADVA agency-wide turnover was
28.65%, as reported by the Office of Personnel Management.
ADVA has a New Hire Orientation Session, conducted by HR, that covers the following topics:
• Onboarding documents – This section focuses on business functions including tax and direct
deposit forms and the Arkansas Diamond Plan (457 plan).
• Benefits – HR reviews benefits materials including for health insurance and voluntary
products.
• Arkansas Public Employees Retirement System (APERS) – HR reviews information about
state employee retirement benefits.
• Policies – Staff review department policies and sign to confirm receipt and understanding.
• Empowering Arkansas State Employees (EASE) – HR provides an overview of the EASE
system, used for timekeeping and leave requests and approval, and time and leave policies
and schedule.
• Tour of office – HR provides an office tour to introduce the employee to coworkers.
Today, New Hire training is focused on onboarding new staff, but does not include formalized job
training specific to their roles. There are not standardized communications or operational practices
followed to ensure the employee clearly understands the expectations they are required to meet for
the job they accepted. Also, leadership does not have standardized protocols they must follow or
uniform resources to give the employee as they begin their new job. There is an opportunity to
connect new hires to ADVA’s mission to connect veterans and their families to state and federal
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
services. On-the-job training may be provided within each division, but there is a lack of formal
expectations for New Hire training.
Rationale: Given the current vacancy and turnover rates, ADVA has a need to onboard new staff
efficiently and effectively.
ADVA identified the need to better support onboarding staff who interface with veterans by creating
job specific protocols and compliance practices to better communicate expectations of the job and
equip them with the tools needed to be successful while supporting increased employee retention
rates. Building a standardized onboarding process and curriculum not only supports new hire
alignment with ADVA’s mission but provides staff with information to begin to perform their work
more quickly and effectively.
While this initiative suggests ADVA would benefit in creating an onboarding program for all new
employees, it is recommended that the department implement this in phases. A core onboarding
program could be developed, with modules depending on the division of assignment. Because the
greatest turnover occurs within the veterans homes division, the department would realize the
greatest benefit by improving the onboarding process for this division. Long-term, all divisions should
provide desk manuals and checklists for their departments. Documenting clearly defined
expectations and operational protocols will better support ADVA employees by providing job-
specific resources while creating a sustainable workplace model throughout the agency.
Implementation Considerations: Some best practices for standardized onboarding
protocols include : 1
• Provide onboarding journeys for veterans homes division employees, with a long-term goal to
expand to all hires. The standardized process should begin at orientation and should account
for the integration phase into their role and through full effectiveness of their role. The detail
and length of journey support will vary based on the skillset, experience and intensity of talent
required for the job role. For example, entry-level positions would require the least amount of
support.
• Utilize technology resources to share content at specified cadence or to enable employees
to search for resources when they are needed.
• Standardize the language used in messaging, communication platforms and engagement
protocols throughout the organization for employees to become familiarized with business
norms and culture.
• Clearly define roles and responsibilities for each role in the organization to support new hires.
This framework will create a support system for new employees to thrive as they transition
into their position.
1
Harvard Business Review, 2019.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Research by Dr. Talya N. Bauer, Cameron Professor of Management at Portland State University,
identifies a framework for a successful onboarding program, known as “the Four Cs”:2
• Compliance – include topics related to security/safety training and on any relevant federal
and state requirements;
• Clarification – include clarity about role, expectations, organization structure;
• Culture – include mission, vision, values; and,
• Connection – connecting new hire to key colleagues, divisions they will interact with.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
When organizations implement standardized practices for onboarding new hires, there is potential
that processes will become impersonal and inflexible. ADVA may wish to include some videos or
testimonials from the veterans it serves and/or leaders and staff from across the organization to
ensure that new hires remain connected to ADVA’s mission. ADVA should also intentionally focus on
providing the employee with an introduction to ADVA’s organizational culture, mission and values.
ADVA may need to assign more resources to this project to ensure sustainability. While it is assumed
the HR team will implement the updated onboarding training, additional resources within each
division are needed to create job shadowing and staff mentoring opportunities. Given that ADVA’s
workforce is lean, and out of recognition that training and mentoring are resource-intensive, new
hires can be used to relieve veteran staff of administrative tasks while they are in training (e.g.,
documentation).
ADVA should also evaluate the success of the newly implemented onboarding program, and make
modifications to improve the program. ADVA should implement a survey or evaluation tool to
measure employee satisfaction and the effectiveness of the transfer of knowledge from the training.
Recommended steps for standardizing onboarding and compliance curriculum (future state):
As ADVA develops its comprehensive new onboarding program, consideration should be given to:
• Detail the connection between the employee hired and ADVA’s core tradition of “ADVAcacy”
in supporting the veteran community.
• Consider mentoring programs, that would partner a new hire with a seasoned employee who
can readily answer immediate questions to fulfill job duties within the first 90 days.
• Include shadowing opportunities for the new hire and all the divisions or teams the employee
will interact with in their job role so they can become familiarized with the different functions
of the department.
• Implement standardized check-ins between department leadership and the new employee
for the first 90 days to ensure expectations are being met.
2
Bamboo HR LLC, “Definitive Guide to Onboarding in 2024”, 2024,The Definitive Guide to Onboarding in 2024
(bamboohr.com)
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Implementation should include the following steps to standardized onboarding and compliance
curriculum:
• HR and Deputy Chief of Staff will collaborate with ADVA leadership to evaluate the current
state of onboarding and compliance practices across divisions.
• ADVA Directors will meet with managers to gather insights into onboarding and compliance
challenges while onboarding new hires. Surveys and focus groups will be used to identify
organizational bottlenecks and vulnerabilities such as storing important files locally.
• HR, Deputy Chief of Staff, and ADVA Leadership will identify the top five areas and
communication channels selected for onboarding improvement based on staff engagement
feedback.
• HR and Deputy Chief of Staff will create a summary report to detail the
onboarding/compliances areas of focus with anticipated cost, efficiency and risks for ADVA
leadership and Secretary General Penn’s approval.
• HR and Deputy Chief of Staff will host a kickoff meeting with division leadership and key
internal stakeholders to communicate strategies, answer questions and assign
accountability for assignments.
• HR and Deputy Chief of Staff will draft, refine, and compile onboarding documents, training,
and resources such as the onboarding checklist and job specific desk manuals.
• HR, Deputy Chief of Staff and ADVA leadership will implement new onboarding and
compliance curriculum statewide. Ongoing evaluation checkpoints will be utilized for HR,
Deputy Chief of Staff and ADVA leadership to monitor change and modify strategies as
needed.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative aligns
with the need to build long-term talent systems to improve onboarding and compliance practices for
new and existing employees.
To mitigate risk for employee turnover and avoid turnover costs, ADVA will utilize staff insights and
expertise to standardize onboarding and compliance protocols. All actions will be completed
utilizing existing staff and internal resources. There are no new staffing positions of funding resources
available for this initiative.
HR and Deputy Chief of Staff will be accountable to lead discussions, meetings, and documentation
with division leadership. They will collaborate closely with the Chief of Staff to ensure all
communication protocols are engaged to review and finalize strategies deployed.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
HR and Deputy Chief of Staff will incorporate feedback from division staff and take into account best
practices and research to standardize protocols that meet the needs of ADVA staff hired and the
veteran community they serve. Consideration should be given to create resources that address
onboarding frustrations that new hires often experience.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
ADVA may consider building the additional training resources as part of this initiative, as summarized
in Figure 3.
Figure 3 – Additional Training Resources for Consideration by ADVA
Resource Benefit(s) Implementation considerations
Manager ● Management will ● HR and division leadership will need to implement
Checklists have standardized consistent reviews to evaluate the various checklists to
per job role guidance to address ensure they remain current and up to date per job role.
all job components. ● HR will need to implement accountability protocols to
● Consistent practices ensure division leadership are utilizing checklists
will be applied when accordingly with new hires.
onboarding new staff ● Division leadership will need to ensure all team members
and as they transition (new and existing) have reviewed newly created checklists
into their new role. to ensure they have the information needed to support
● All employees receive success in their role.
consistent messaging ● ADVA may want to collect staff acknowledgement for the
checklist review, which will support performance reviews
and help address ongoing job performances with
employees.
Employee ● Employees will have ● Role-specific manuals will require continuous evaluation
Desk standardized by division leadership to ensure desk manuals remain
Manuals guidance and readily current.
available references ● Standardized protocols should be defined to hold division
to perform job duties. leadership accountable to document changes for desk
● Consistent manuals individually by job role.
expectations and ● HR will need to implement accountability protocols to
requirements will be ensure division leadership are utilizing desk manuals
readily available for accordingly with new hires.
reference to promote ● Division leadership will need to ensure all team members
performance (new and existing) have access to their own desk manual.
success. ● Staff and Leadership acknowledgement will need to be
● All employees receive collected either through signature or other tracking
consistent mechanisms to confirm receipt of this resource. This
messaging. acknowledgment will help provide coaching, interventions,
and address concerns with job performance.
● Costs will be incurred for the creation and upkeep of hard
copy desk manuals.
On- ● Anytime accessibility ● This could involve recurring costs to create or purchase
demand to support staff materials.
training schedules and ● Need a learning management platform for training
resources availability accessibility when employees are available, and to store
training records.
Use of In- ● Offers real-time ● This involves travel costs.
Person training with ● This may create additional staff administrative burden or
Training question-and-answer detract from job duties.
capabilities.
● May improve
workforce morale
and strengthen
commitment to
mission.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Resource Benefit(s) Implementation considerations
Live virtual ● Real time training ● Consider a standing monthly meeting where employees
webinars with question-and- can avoid scheduling conflicts.
(for answer capabilities.
refresher
training)
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: This initiative will
standardize onboarding and compliance practices for new and existing ADVA employees.
Performance Measures to be tracked:
• Number of new employees hired post launch of standardized protocols per division;
• Number of existing employees who reviewed new onboarding materials compared to total
number of existing employees per division;
• Number of training courses offered by platform;
• Number of staff who attended and accessed training resources by platform; and,
• Satisfaction rate of new employees upon completing onboarding.
Expected Outcomes:
• Higher employee satisfaction scores;
• Decreased rates of new hire turnover within varying checkpoints of time from hire date (30,
60, 90 days, 6 months, 1 year);
• Increased employee retention rates;
• Improved patient satisfaction scores; and,
• Workforce culture shift with increased employee morale.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: This initiative is not expected to result in a positive fiscal impact, but by
strengthening ADVA’s workforce, is an enabling practice that will support implementation of other
strategic initiatives. In implementing its new training and onboarding program, ADVA will utilize
existing resources and staff. No outside expertise will be needed for this development or facilitation
of training sessions.
Change Management Plan: Standardized onboarding and compliance protocols for new hires
across ADVA divisions will better equip employees for performing to expectation and increasing the
quality of services delivered to the veteran community. Key activities and timing for communication
plan are included in Appendix A – ADVA Work Plan and summarized in Figure 4.
Figure 4 – ADVA-01 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Veteran Services • We will be creating standardized Division meetings Richelle Garcia
Division onboarding and compliance protocols to Staff meetings and Melissa
leadership better support new hires. Focus Groups Butler
Directors and • We will also train existing employees in Surveys
Managers the new standardization protocols to
ensure all staff receive consistent
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
messaging of the job expectations they
are required to meet.
• We will collaborate with you to identify
organizational bottlenecks and
vulnerabilities with this process.
• You (as leadership) will also be provided
with standardized resources to better
transition new hires into your division for
enhanced performance expectations
while they serve the veteran community.
Current Staff • We created new standardized Team meetings ADVA Division
onboarding and compliance protocols to Staff emails Leadership
better support employees. 1:1 meeting between
• New hires receive this information and leadership and direct
resources at the time of hire. reports
• Existing employees are being given this Performance
training and resources to better support evaluations
our entire workforce to excel in their Coaching sessions
roles.
• These desk manuals define the newly
defined expectations for staff to comply
with.
All ADVA Staff Introductory comprehensive recorded video Recorded video to be Richelle Garcia,
(existing and that introduces division leadership with accessible as needed Melissa Butler,
new hires) background of what the agency does as well for staff Public Affairs,
as individual departments. and IT
ADVA-02: Upskilling County and District Veteran Service Officers
This initiative improves standards of excellence and training accessibility for District Veteran Service
Officers (DVSO) and County Veterans’ Services Officers (CVSO) to increase the number and
percentage of successful veteran benefits claims.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Arkansas Department of Veteran Affairs (ADVA)
administers a network of Veteran Service Officers (VSOs) throughout the state. Some are state
employees, while others are employed by the counties. The state has nine districts served by five
Veteran Service Organizations; some Organizations cover two districts. There are also over seventy-
five county VSOs, hired and supervised by county judges.
VSOs assist veterans and their families to identify and access available benefits, file benefit claims,
and represent them in Veterans Affairs hearings. Most of the VSOs activity assists veterans with
disability claims. VSOs are critical resources to assist veterans in navigating federal and state
requirements. The application, notifications, and processes are complex and can be difficult to
navigate without assistance. VSOs help veterans to better understand requirements and processes,
assist in gathering the necessary documentation to adjudicate a claim, and can provide guidance to
access other needed benefits; making it easier for veterans to attain the benefits and resources they
need.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
ADVA has limited training resources for DVSOs and CVSOs. There is annual training, which has been
virtual in recent years, and training resources are available online. ADVA does not have a full-time
training coordinator, nor a systematic means of tracking the training received by DVSOs beyond a
manual, Excel-based log. For VSOs operated by non-governmental organizations, additional training
resources may be available. For example, VFW operates an online Learning Management System
called PsychArmor, which is an educational platform that offers hundreds of courses on military
culture, mental health, caregiving, employment, and other pertinent issues.
This initiative is to improve the DVSO’s and CVSO’s skills and effectiveness and provide them with
necessary training and professional development to be successful and effective. This effort will
strengthen the workforce to support consistent service delivery and communication statewide.
Rationale: To increase the effectiveness of the VSOs’ ability to assist veterans, ADVA is developing
a formal training program that will help veterans receive accurate, clear, and consistent information.
A formalized program will help to address the fact that VSOs are dispersed throughout the state and
employed by multiple employers, which can lead to different messages and information delivered to
Arkansas’s veterans.
This training program will help VSOs to serve veterans better and increase veterans access to needed
benefits. Veterans and their families experience unique and challenging situations. VSOs must be
trained on relevant policies and requirements and how to apply them to a given situation to provide
support. DVSOs and CVSOs must have access to information about federal and state laws (which
are subject to change) that impact administration of veterans benefits, as well as other federal and
state programs.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – ADVA Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with ADVA staff and review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
DVSOs and CVSOs are effective advocates for veterans, working hard to see that they attain their
rights and obtain needed benefits. By improving standards of excellence and developing a training
program that fosters a learning culture, ADVA will improve DVSO/CVSO’s effectiveness and enhance
veterans ability to access benefits and services.
By considering the needs of the VSOs and recognizing potential risks and mitigation, ADVA can foster
an environment that values continuous learning, professional development, and better customer
service, leading to success by:
• Identifying an owner/resource to support training initiatives and ensure continued focus and
prioritization on the importance of training.
• Avoiding insufficient training uptake by ensuring that training sessions are engaging and
accessible, providing incentives for completion, and scheduling follow-up sessions to
reinforce learning.
• Conducting regular feedback to understand VSOs needs and concerns.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Ensuring business continuity while training is occurring; mitigated by scheduling critical
operational activities during non-training periods and assigning employees from other ADVA
divisions to answer calls and other urgent communications.
• Measuring the increase in benefit awards and VSO skill set improvement.
• Identifying a small group of district and county VSOs to pilot training.
• Building a business case and seeking resources to implement survey software to track
program results.
• Developing a central accessible portal to store training materials.
Recommended steps for improving training for DVSOs (future state):
• Conduct a needs assessment with DVSOs using surveys and interviews to understand
specific skill gaps and common training and professional interests.
• Compile a full portfolio of data, learnings, and material from past trainings including slide
decks, participant feedback, performance metrics, and training outcomes to inform and
develop a tailored curriculum addressing survey and interview responses.
• Develop a business continuity plan.
• Design a multi-tiered communication plan that addresses different stakeholder groups,
ensuring tailored messages that resonate with each group’s concerns and roles.
• Determine the value of developing podcasts and videos.
• Develop a training evaluation form to be completed after each training session.
• Develop interactive stories to be included in the training curriculum.
• Implement a predefined section of the training with a pilot representative sample of 3-4
DVSOs and 10-15 CVSOs through a virtual upskilling session for feedback and refinement
of curriculum.
• Build a business case and seek resources to implement survey software to track program
results and a central portal to store training materials.
• Develop and implement communication plan.
• Adjust the training program based on pilot feedback to ensure it meets participants’ needs,
hold “lessons learned” sessions to gather input from participants and coworkers to identify
and implement ideas for improvement.
• Present a detailed report summarizing the development process, pilot results,
modifications made, and the final training program to Secretary General Penn + other ADVA
leadership for final approval.
• Explore opportunities to centralize existing training materials and increase asynchronous
access through digital platforms (e.g., an online learning portal such as Psych Armor,
uploading program material, and other important information for Arkansas DVSOs and
CVSOs to access).
• Implement the full-scale training program with all CVSOs and DVSOs during annual training
session; monitor ongoing impact of program and adapt as needed.
• Develop an ongoing assessment tool and sequence for administration of the tool.
• Conduct training needs assessments.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources
The vision of the ADVA is to “recognizing the value of Veterans to Arkansas, the ADVA will be the
state’s leading advocate and resource responsive to the changing needs of veterans and their
families in attaining the highest quality of life.” One of the principal advocates for veterans is the VSO.
The VSO to achieve success and become an effective voice for veterans is to possess the skills to
motivate and inform veterans and their families of available benefits and resources. To that end, a
formal training program that delivers clear, consistent, and concise information to VSOs will provide
a foundation that provides the skill and knowledge to better the life of veterans and their families,
which is directly aligned to the department’s mission.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans:
Understanding the needs of the workforce and the customers they serve is fundamental to adapting
and pivoting to address the ongoing and unique challenges they face. These needs and the situations
faced are not constant. Change can occur in one’s life situation, the process for addressing these,
and the resources or solutions available. Change management is planning and delivering new means
of addressing these changes. A vigorous communication plan will be the vehicle to disseminate
these changes and the information associated with them.
A clear picture of need and what the future will look like will enable a more effective organization and
the ability to serve veterans. ADVA obtaining input from VSO’s and assessing their needs will help
develop their formal training program. Evaluating the courses after each session will provide instant
feedback. Ongoing assessment will help adapt to the changes that most surely will occur. All of these
will lead to a more dynamic and adaptable approach to improve efficiency and veterans quality of
life.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The results of this initiative are to improve effectiveness of the VSOs and increase the total value and
percentage of veterans obtaining eligible benefits.
The recommended performance measures for this initiative are:
• Increase in number of veterans matched with benefits increased with benefits increased
average benefit award.
• Improved benefits matching outcomes for veterans.
• Upskilling for department VSOs and county VSOs.
• Higher levels of contact between VSOs across the state.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented:
ADVA-2 is an initiative that will enable the department to achieve its objectives but is not expected to
have a significant fiscal impact on ADVA. Development of new training resources (whether in-house
or through purchase) is expected to have some cost but result in an increase in benefits to the
veterans’ served by ADVA.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
This initiative could begin implementation in the fall of 2024 and take six to nine months.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration with county governments, VSOs, state leadership,
veterans and their families, and with community stakeholders is critical to this initiative. State
leaders and county governments need to be included and engaged in this communication plan
because they will need to arrange the necessary resources, provide encouragement so that the
trainings are well attended, and promote the value so that citizens are informed and understand how
to access services during the trainings. Key activities and timing for the communication plan are in
summarized in Figure 5.
Figure 5 – ADVA-02 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities
Affected staff • Benefits of training, showing the value • Departmental and county
to workers and veterans by improving VSO’s emails
the VSOs skill and knowledge. • VSO staff meetings
• Feedback of assessments • Virtual meetings or
• Performance measures roadshow
• Memos
Veterans and their • The goal of the VSO training is to • Website
families improve effectiveness and provide • Telephonic outreach
better access to eligible benefits.
• How to contact VSOs during trainings.
County Governments • Purpose of training. • Emails
• Business continuity plan. • Telephonic outreach
• Curriculum • Memos
• Time and place of trainings
• Feedback of assessments
• Performance measures
State Leadership • The purpose of trainings • Emails
• Training value • Memos
• Schedule • Face-to-face meetings
• Business continuity plan
• Performance measures
ADVA-03: Modify recruitment practices to sustainably staff veteran
cemeteries
This initiative seeks to improve veterans ability to implement a targeted and specific recruitment and
hiring strategy for veteran cemeteries to ensure adequate staffing and to remain compliant with
Federal Veteran Affairs regulations, ensuring sustained federal funding.
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADVA operates two cemeteries to commemorate the
military service of deceased Arkansas veterans and family members. The Arkansas State Veterans’
Cemetery at North Little Rock was authorized in 1997, during the 81st Arkansas General Assembly.
The cemetery is situated on an 82-acre site in North Little Rock at 1501 West Maryland Avenue. In
2008, a second Arkansas State Veterans’ Cemetery was created at Birdeye with the purchase of a
100-acre property. Construction began in the Fall 2010 and the first interment was conducted in
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February 2012. Last year there were over 700 burials at the North Little Rock location and 65 at the
Birdeye cemetery.
Veterans’ cemeteries symbolize our country’s gratitude to veterans for their sacrifices and
contributions, and they were created to provide a dignified resting place that reflects the value that
veterans deserve. Veterans’ cemeteries are considered distinguished, noble, and honorable for
several reasons:
• Respect for Service: Veterans’ cemeteries are dedicated to honoring the service of U.S.
military veterans and their families. Being interred in a veterans’ cemetery is a sign of respect
for their contributions to the country.
• Ceremonial Customs: Veterans’ cemeteries often uphold high standards for military
ceremonies and honors, including full military funerals, the playing of taps, and the
presentation of the flag. These traditions emphasize the importance of recognizing and
respecting veterans’' service.
• Historical Significance: Many Veterans’ cemeteries are located at sites of historical
significance or have historical monuments and markers. They serve as a reminder of the
nation's history and the sacrifices made by those who served.
• High Standards of Care: Veterans’ cemeteries are maintained to a high standard, ensuring
that the grounds are well-kept and that the final resting places of veterans’ are treated with
dignity and respect. This level of care reflects the nation's commitment to honoring its
veterans’.
• Community and Legacy: Veterans’ cemeteries often become places of community
remembrance and reflection. They serve as enduring symbols of the nation's gratitude and
the legacy of those who have served in the armed forces.
The United States Department of Veteran Affairs (USDVA) places a strong emphasis on maintaining
a high standard of appearance and service. To ensure that quality standards are met, the USDVA
monitors the quality of its state cemetery grant program recipients through a triannual compliance
review. During this review, USDVA inspects and assesses grounds operations, equipment, turf,
facilities, and burial/cremains cemetery for compliance with their standards. Cemeteries must make
corrective actions (if there are issues) to continue to be eligible for USDVA financial support. This
process ensures that state cemeteries continue to meet the requirements expected of a national
program.
The National Cemetery Administration and the Veterans’ Cemetery Grants Program compliance
review team conducted an onsite inspection of the Birdeye State Veterans’ Cemetery during
November 2023. The national review teams monitor and inspect the Veterans’ cemeteries across the
United States. The monitoring tool includes over 90 measures, and the categories are classified into
critical, high, and medium compliance sections. The Birdeye cemetery scorecard results:
• Critical compliance - 100%
• High compliance - 100%
• Medium compliance - 98%
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
The National Cemetery Administration and the Veterans’ Cemetery Grants Program compliance
review team conducted an onsite inspection of the North Little Rock State VA Cemetery during
January 2024. The North Little Rock cemetery scorecard results:
• Critical compliance - 100%
• High compliance - 86%
• Medium compliance - 98%
The 86% score in the high compliance category required a corrective action plan to remediate the
deficiencies identified by the review team. Some examples included:
• The category of grounds maintenance, measure 5.2.1 – “Sand, mineral, or turf in visually
prominent areas are generally weed free.” Ten of the sections inspected at North Little Rock
did not meet the criteria.
• The category of headstone, marker, and niche cover operations, measure 6.3.1 – “The percent
of headstones, markers, or niche covers set within 10 calendar days.” From January 2023
through January 2024, 559 of 640 were set within 10 days. The target is 95% and North Little
Rock achieved 87%.
• The category of internment operations, measure 7.5.1a – “Daily interment or inurnment sites
are marked with a correct and aligned temporary marker.” Of the ten temporary markers
inspected to verify they were correctly placed and aligned, 4 markers met the criteria, and 6
markers did not meet the criteria.
Although almost all of the 90+ measures were met and the overall scores were relatively high, it is
evident in the failed measures that a depleted workforce contributed to the performance.
Staffing Needs
Cemetery workers are the backbone of the veterans’ cemeteries workforce. They provide dignified
burial services for veterans’ and eligible family members by maintaining the sites in pristine condition
to serve as national shrines to commemorate their legacy, service, and sacrifice to our nation. The
Little Rock Veterans’ Cemetery is staffed with seven Maintenance Technicians and one Supervisor.
The cemetery has seven allocated tech positions and three are currently vacant. Of the four existing
tech positions that are filled, only one is filled by an individual with more than two years of experience.
The Birdeye Veterans’ Cemetery is staffed with three Maintenance Technicians and one Supervisor.
The Birdeye location is completely staffed and has had limited to no attrition over the last several
years. Figure 6 summarizes workload and staffing at the two locations.
Figure 6 – Workload and Staffing for State Veterans’ Cemeteries
State VA Cemetery Annual Burials # of Allocated Workload
Workers
North Little Rock 700 7 100:1
Birdeye 65 3 21:1
The identified area of concern is the GS-O4 Maintenance Technician positions at the North Little
Rock Veterans’ Cemetery. ADVA leadership interviews, focus groups, and research conducted in
August 2024 identified several key themes regarding the ADVA cemetery workforce, including the
inability to attract and keep workers, primarily at the North Little Rock Cemetery. One leader stated
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
in addition to the challenging nature of the work, the salary does not help attract candidates or keep
their workforce. Commonly cited workforce challenges included:
• Low compensation and/or not competitive with similar private sector jobs;
• Challenging work;
• Nature of the work; and,
• The job title and description does not match the type of work.
The inability to keep the North Little Rock Veterans’ Cemetery positions filled and the challenge of
finding new workers jeopardizes the high standards expected for Veterans’ cemeteries. Challenges
associated with finding new workers could include:
• The potential for perception and stigma associated with working in cemeteries might impact
how potential candidates view the job or the industry as a whole.
• The pay for cemetery workers may not always be competitive compared to other trades or
services requiring similar levels of skill and physical labor, making it harder to attract and
retain qualified employees.
• Working in a cemetery often involves physically demanding tasks like digging graves and
setting or moving headstones, maintaining grounds, and operating heavy equipment. It can
also require working in weather conditions such as heat, rain, and other inclement
conditions.
• The job can be emotionally taxing, as it involves end-of-life tasks including the acceptance
of urns and caskets. The associated emotional strain could deter some people from
pursuing working in a cemetery as a job or career.
Compensation Challenges
Compensation is a critical element for recruiting and retention success in more challenging careers
and positions. The lack of a strong compensation strategy and salary progression signals to potential
applicants that there are limited opportunities and career growth.
The starting salary for a GS-04 position in Arkansas is $32,405 dollars annually. The salary for
cemetery jobs can vary widely based on factors such as the specific role within the cemetery,
location, level of experience, and the size and type of the cemetery.
The Arkansas Legislature, recognizing the issue related to the need for all agencies, including ADVA,
to attract talented candidates, especially in challenging workforce areas, passed Act 172 in the 2024
session. Section 21-5-227 of the Act allows for “Special compensation awards” “to recognize an
employee’s outstanding performance in successfully completing a significant project or job
assignment or completing a major project milestone…”3 The department determines whether to offer
the special compensation award and it can be a lump sum bonus not to exceed $5,000 per award
and up to 40 hours of incentive leave that shall be used at the end of the calendar year. It still will
require Governor, Legislature, and administrative approval. The impacted divisions at ADVA have yet
to create these specific recognition plans.
3
Arkansas Legislature, https://www.arkleg.state.ar.us/Bills/Detail?id=sb77&ddBienniumSession=2023%2F2024F
18
ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
ADVA has proposed changing the paygrade and job classification to better align with the duties of
working in a cemetery. The special compensation awards outlined in Act 172 could be available in
the near future as the recommended changes are considered.
Other Challenges
Compensation is part of the equation and is being addressed through the Personnel Plan
workstream in the Arkansas Forward Project to help alleviate some of the salary issues currently
experienced within ADVA. While compensation matters to those in the public sector, there are other
motivating factors that are aptly captured in Figure 7.4
Figure 7 – State government Talent Challenges
Source: McKinsey & Company, 2022.
Additionally, ADVA cemetery leadership feel strongly the job is not properly classified and could be
more specific in the job tasks required. Although some of the duties align with a “Maintenance
Technician” job, many applicants are surprised when they learn the job is located at the ADVA
cemetery and that tasks required are not typical maintenance technician tasks.
Rationale: This initiative recommends that ADVA modify their recruitment practices and more
accurately classify the job to sustainably staff their veteran cemeteries. Although the workforce is
small, the cemetery worker positions are mission critical for ADVA, have proven difficult to recruit
and retain, and use of temporary workers is an additional cost to the department.
4
2022 Great Attrition, Great Attraction 2.0 global survey - Public Sector
19
ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
In the short-term, while implementing this initiative, there is an opportunity to review the workload
and staffing model, as presented above in Figure 7 by doing the following:
• ADVA leadership could consider shifting a worker position from Birdeye to North Little Rock
on a permanent or rotating basis until the staffing shortage and workload conditions
improve at North Little Rock.
• Although ADVA leadership believes the North Little Rock Cemetery can function with 7
workers, consideration of additional FTE for North Little Rock could be explored.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – ADVA Work Plan provides the action steps
in the recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the
implementation process identified through interviews and work sessions with department staff and
review of other state best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Consider eliminating the one general job title specified as maintenance technician for all of
the different cemetery work. It can be a detriment for recruiting workers as it is confusing to
applicants to what their actual duties would be. For future consideration, setting up
multiple more specialized job titles like other cemeteries can afford the flexibility to pay low
rates for basic grounds keepers, while increasing the rate for more valuable and
knowledgeable caretakers and maintenance / mechanical positions. It would also provide a
career path when combined with a training / cross-training program, and even more so if
there was salary progression aligned pay levels within each job title.
Best practice examples from other states/organizations operating veteran cemeteries include:
US Department of Veteran Affairs / National Cemetery Administration (NCA)
• Classify job titles into clearly defined roles. Instead of one job title that lumps numerous
roles like a maintenance / technician into one title, the NCA offers more granularity in roles
including gardener, cemetery caretaker, and maintenance / mechanic job titles. These more
specific job titles have different duties and pay ranges. The more granular job
titles/description also allows them to provide a specific promotion path and helps them
retain employees.
• Communicate pay rates as a salary, but also as salary and benefits combined, reminding
applicants of the true compensation value.
• Pay rates at the NCA are significantly higher than ADVA and the higher pay facilitates the
recruitment of more experienced and professional applicants. This helps NCA to conduct
cemetery operations more efficiently and provide higher quality results.
• NCA does an excellent job of communicating the importance and honor involved in serving
veterans and their families through providing veteran cemetery services. ADVA should
consider adopting some of the NCA communication messaging.
• ADVA should review the NCA careers website and consider modelling ADVA job
titles/descriptions on the national model.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Recommended steps to target and attract a workforce for the ADVA cemeteries:
• Establish working group with Office of Personnel Management (OPM) to review the cemetery
worker job description and pay grade classification;
• Immediately begin adding cemetery worker responsibilities and duties to the OPM job
requisition external posting preview. An applicant will see this narrative before the core
“Maintenance Technician” job description.
• Implement the special compensation awards outlined in Act 172 passed in the 2024
legislative session. Although the Department has not developed an Act 172 plan, is
anticipated funding freed up from reduced use of contract staff could be used for this
purpose.
• Assess value in developing a mandatory and rigorous, realistic job preview video similar to
the video posted on the USDVA National Cemetery Administrations website
(cem.va.gov/careers/), as part of the ADVA hiring process and completed before an
application is submitted. ADVA may elect to share the federal video instead of developing a
state video. Viewing a job preview video will improve the applicant’s understanding of the
job, increasing the quality of the applicant pool, and help the applicant understand ADVA
job expectations.
• Conduct a compensation analysis of other state managed veteran cemeteries and similar
private sector jobs in like size states.
• Identify new sources of talent, such as partnerships with veterans’’ organizations, the
Arkansas National Guard, and the Little Rock Air Force base.
• Develop a digital-based employment branding plan to increase the size and quality of
candidate pools and refresh and rebrand the ADVA Facebook page, website, and other social
media channels.
• Develop a strategic marketing and recruitment plan that contains a complete profile of the
ideal candidate, a more creative and targeted analysis of the best places to source for talent,
and positive branding and messaging to promote positive occupational awareness about the
ADVA cemetery positions.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Based on interviews
with ADVA leadership, ADVA would need to collaborate with OPM to support this initiative to review
(improve and/or change) the job descriptions and postings to improve the recruitment and selection
process.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
Training and development of staff can help employees learn or strengthen skills; increase
confidence, motivation and productivity. Leadership programs and mentoring create community.
Best practice adoption builds credibility. To retain skilled employees and develop future leaders, it is
critical to understand employee career objectives and align them with organizational goals. This
initiative enables both career development and leadership development to help employees gain new
skills and feel engaged with peers, management and ADVA. By encouraging a learning culture ADVA
ensures that employees take an active role in spreading knowledge and best practices throughout
their organization. These factors all lead to happier employees and better employee retention for a
stronger, more effective organization.
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Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: Proposed metrics
to assess the impact of this initiative include:
• Percentage of positions filled (expected to increase);
• Improved NCA grade (expected to increase);
• Retention and average employee tenure (expected to increase);
• Time to hire (expected to decrease); and,
• Increased number of applicants.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented:
This initiative can be accomplished through existing appropriations. It is anticipated that ADVA
leadership, communications officer, and existing human resources staff with OPM assistance would
coordinate these new initiatives.
Cost savings and cost avoidance opportunities could be captured in the future, including reduced
costs related to overtime and payment for contract staffing (temporary employees), reduced costs
related to staff turnover, and increased employee retention. As discussed, this initiative could be
accompanied by an upfront initial investment aligned with recently passed Act 172 to allow for
special compensation awards in the mission critical area of the veterans’ cemeteries.
Change Management Plan: It is not anticipated this initiative would require a change
management plan. Clear communication with staff about the purpose of the change in job
title/description should accompany the implementation of the change.
ADVA-05: Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and
efficiency
This initiative is part of the broader Arkansas Forward Agile Organization initiative and includes
implementing a tailored and modernized organization to ensure effective distribution of
management responsibilities, enhanced operational efficiency, and improved role clarity among
managerial positions.
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADVA has established shared services for finance,
human resources, IT, and communications. The three remaining divisions align with the
programmatic functions performed by the department: veterans’ cemeteries, veterans’ homes, and
veterans’ service officer network. The different and specialized functions of each division impact the
staffing model used. In addition, significant vacancies exist in two of the three divisions, which are
addressed through the related initiatives: ADVA-3 and ADVA-7.
Rationale: As part of Initiative ADVA-5, to create the most agile and efficient organization, ADVA
determined organizational changes in the cemeteries and veterans’ homes divisions are not advised
at this time, as the greatest organizational need of those divisions is to address employee vacancies.
An opportunity to address the VSO Division Director’s large span of control (16 direct reports) was
identified and addressed by creating a deputy role and consolidating the business operations, quality
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
assurance, and administrative staff under this role (see Figure 2 for visualization of these changes).
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – ADVA Work Plan provides the action steps
in the recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
This initiative is not expected to require change management or other risks. The Division Leader will
want to ensure impacted staff understand the reason for the change, and that roles and
responsibilities for the team are created to ensure they best support the Division Director.
Recommended steps to implement changes to ADVA’s organization structure include:
Working with directly impacted staff to make the organization change.
Alignment with department priorities staffing and resources: The proposed
organization chart for ADVA is provided above in Figure 2.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: None are anticipated.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: No fiscal impact is
anticipated.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: Metrics are not
anticipated to be required to implement this initiative.
In addition to these measures, surveys could be utilized for impacted staff during the transition to
identify and address any issues or concerns.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: This initiative is not expected to result in cost savings.
ADVA-06: Focus on talent targeting and broadening career paths for
nurses and Certified Nurse Assistant (CNAs) in veteran homes
This initiative seeks to improve ADVA’s ability to target and attract talent and to develop careers paths
for employees working in the state-operated veterans’ homes, to improve the employee experience
and continually develop skills needed to deliver the best service to Arkansans.
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADVA operates two state veterans’ homes located in
Fayetteville and North Little Rock, with a September 2024 census of 46 and 83, respectively. Critical
workforce shortages and needs were highlighted by ADVA veteran home leadership in the primary
area of nursing, to include CNAs, Licensed Practical Nurses, and Registered Nurses. Being able to
hire qualified nurses that can provide quality long-term care for the state’s veterans is critical to the
ADVA mission and core belief that Arkansas’ veterans deserve a high quality of care when they need
assistance or can no longer care for themselves. Ensuring quality care provision for the veterans
served in the state-operated homes is directly aligned with ADVA’s ability to build a high-quality,
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
professional, and stable workforce.
ADVA leadership interviews conducted in September 2024 identified several key themes regarding
the ADVA nursing workforce, including high vacancy rates and the inability to attract applicants. One
leader stated “We just can’t hire any nursing or CNA staff with the salaries we offer” and “workforce
is ADVA homes’ biggest challenge.” Commonly cited workforce challenges included:
• Low compensation and lack of competitiveness with the private sector;
• Lack of talent pool;
• No career ladder;
• Lack of resources; and,
• Little to no flexibility with salary adjustments.
ADVA has experienced a severe shortage of nurses and CNAs at both veterans’ homes, operating with
more than half the positions vacant (see Figure 8). CNAs at the two homes make up the largest
number of staff (147) and 64% of the positions are vacant. RNs and LPNs account for 63 positions
and only 9 are filled with FTEs. The two homes have 86% of the nursing positions vacant.
Figure 8 – Vacancies at the ADVA Veteran Homes, September 2024
Position Total Filled Vacant
Registered Nurse 23 4 19
Licensed Practical Nurse 40 5 35
Position Total Filled Vacant
Certified Nursing Assistant 147 53 94
Total 210 62 148
Source: Arkansas Department of Veterans Affairs.
Compensation Analysis Across States
The two veterans’ homes are operating with a 70% staff vacancy rate, requiring ADVA to use
temporary contracted staff for nurses and other positions at much higher rates than if salaries were
enhanced to attract staff. During state fiscal year 2023, ADVA spent $5,590,335 on staff at the two
veterans’ homes and $8,315,569 for contracted staff to maintain operations.
Many of the nurses and CNAs that leave ADVA are working for contracted agencies and are being paid
sometimes two times as much as the salaries they left behind at the veterans’ homes. Those that
move into other private sector nursing positions typically can earn significantly more than they could
earn in the public sector in Arkansas.
Compensation is a critical element for successful recruiting and retention of ADVA staff. The lack of
a strong compensation strategy and salary progression signals to potential applicants limited
opportunities and the unpredictability of rewards.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 9 – Arkansas Veterans’ Home Salary Comparison to National Average, by Type
Arkansas Veterans’ National Salary
Position Type Home Starting Salary Arkansas Salary Range Average
Registered Nurse $73,404 $63,830 - $88,055 $86,070
Licensed Practical Nurse $36,155 $36,155 - $52,425 $58,140
Certified Nursing Assistant $31,892 $26,034 - $37,749 $41,724
Sources: ARcareers.arkansas.gov, ZipRecruiter
National Nursing Workforce Shortage
The United States is experiencing a national nursing labor shortage and according to the American
Association of College of Nursing, the U.S. is projected to experience a shortage of Registered Nurses
(RNs).
Factors contributing to the nursing shortage include:
1. An aging population
2. Nurse burnout
3. Nursing school capacity
The US Chamber of Commerce reports there will be at least 193,000 projected job openings for
registered nurses (RNs) on average per year until 2032. The Chamber expects only 177,400 nurses to
enter the workforce each year between 2022 – 2032 which is considerably less than what is required
to fill the openings.5
To continue painting a bleak outlook on hiring nurses, the national unemployment rate as of
December 2023 was 3.7% and the nursing unemployment rate was 1.6%.
The US Chamber also reported that from 2020 to 2021, the number of registered nurses in the
workforce decreased by over 100,000, marking the largest decline in the last forty years. A
considerable portion of these departing nurses were under 35 years old, with the majority being
previously employed within hospital settings.6
The American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) is working to address the shortage by
shaping legislation, identifying strategies, and forming collaborations. The National Nursing Shortage
Task Force Act of 2023 was introduced to address the shortage by forming a task force to issue policy
recommendations.
5
American Association of Colleges of Nursing, Fact Sheet: Nursing Shortage, May 2024,
https://www.aacnnursing.org/news-data/fact-sheets/nursing-shortage.
6
US Chamber of Commerce, “Data Deep Dive: A National Nursing Crisis,” January 29, 2024,
https://www.uschamber.com/workforce/nursing-workforce-data-center-a-national-nursing-crisis.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
The impact is being felt across all medical facilities and according to the Federal Department of
Veterans’ Affairs Inspector General, every veterans’ facility in the country experienced at least two
severe staffing shortages in 2023. The most common shortages are for practical nurses and nursing
assistants. The Veterans Health Administration (VHA) has also seen high turnover rates in recent
years, like the rest of the healthcare industry.
Compensation is part of the equation and is being addressed through the Personnel Plan workstream in
the Arkansas Forward Project to help alleviate some of the salary issues currently experienced within
ADVA. Additionally, the Arkansas legislature, recognizing the issue related to the need for all agencies,
including ADVA, to attract talented candidates, especially in these nursing and CNA workforce areas,
passed Act 172 in the 2024 session. Section 21-5-227 of the Act allows for “special compensation
awards” “to recognize an employee’s outstanding performance in successfully completing a significant
project or job assignment or completing a major project milestone…”7 The department determines
whether to offer the special compensation award and it can be a lump sum bonus not to exceed
$5,000 per award and up to 40 hours of incentive leave that shall be used at the end of the calendar
year. It still will require Governor, Legislative and Administrative approval and the impacted divisions at
ADVA have yet to create these specific recognition plans. ADVA believes that it will be difficult to grant
additional leave as an incentive when shift coverage is one of the main drivers for creating the
recognition in the first place. While compensation matters to those in the public sector there are
other motivating factors, as discussed above in Figure 7.8
The costs associated with recruiting, hiring, and training new state employees can be considerable,
with some estimates of replacing an employee ranging from approximately 16% to 200% of spending
on annual salaries9; by other estimates, 150% of a departed employee’s annual salary.10
The costs associated with recruiting, hiring, and training new state employees can be considerable,
with some estimates of replacing an employee ranging from approximately 16% to 200% of spending
on annual salaries9; by other estimates, 150% of a departed employee’s annual salary.10
7
Arkansas Legislature, https://www.arkleg.state.ar.us/Bills/Detail?id=sb77&ddBienniumSession=2023%2F2024F
8
2022 Great Attrition, Great Attraction 2.0 global survey - Public Sector
9
Government Executive, “What Keeps Public Employees In Their Jobs? It’s Not Just Pay,” January 11, 2023,
https://www.govexec.com/management/2023/01/what-keeps-public-employees-their-jobs-its-not-just-
pay/381709/#:~:text=Turnover%20among%20government%20employees%20is,experience%20required%20f
or%20the%20job.
10
Route 50, “Replacing a Government Employee Can Cost 150% of Worker's Salary,” July 22, 2021,
https://www.route-fifty.com/workforce/2021/07/replacing-government-employee-can-cost-150-workers-
salary/183989/
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Rationale: This initiative recommends that ADVA target and attract talent and develop careers
paths for employees to improve the employee experience and continually develop skills needed to
deliver the best service to Arkansans veterans. This initiative seeks to:
● Target: Conduct skills demand forecasting and use current skills assessments.
● Attract: Develop an employee value proposition assessment, financial and non-financial
recruiting incentives, and more flexible hiring bonuses, and seek to attract new sources of
talent.
● Develop career paths: Work with OPM to develop career paths for nursing and CNA
positions to offer opportunities for advancement and enhance skills development and
sharing of best practices to improve overall experience and effectiveness of Arkansas state
government.
The development of career paths through the implementation of specialized training, incorporating
mentorship, and tuition reimbursement, ADVA and the state may have the opportunity to increase
talent identification of highly qualified individuals, improve retention, and increase internal
promotion. In addition, the Arkansas may benefit from the increased production of high quality and
well-trained employees delivering services.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A – ADVA Work Plan provides the action steps
in the recommended sequence for implementation of this initiative. Research suggests that as the
CNA and nursing crisis continues to unfold, states, training providers, workforce agencies, and
employers have adopted strategies focused on compensation increases, stipends and signing
bonuses, and subsidized training. A multipronged approach that prioritizes pay and career
advancement can help improve outcomes for recruiting and retaining nurses and CNAs.
Considerations for the implementation process identified through interviews with department staff
and review of other best practices include:
● The U.S. Department of Veterans’ Affairs (VA) provides federal assistance to State Veteran
Homes (SVH) for the hiring and retention of nurses. Additional payments are available to
SVHs that receive per diem payments and have a documented nursing shortage. Under this
program, an SVH can receive funds for up to 50% of the cost of employee incentive programs,
but not for standard employee benefits, such as salaries (Congressional Research Service
2020). ADVA should pursue federal funding.
● The Baltimore Public Health Pathways Program offers a $1,000 per month stipend for CNA
trainees with tuition assistance and a guaranteed job upon completion.
● The Georgia CNA Career Pathway Initiative provides 500 stipends of $5,000 each, paid in
three milestones (starting training, completing training, and six months of employment).
● Wisconsin’s WisCaregiver Careers offers $500 bonuses after six months of CAN employment.
● Subsidized CNA training and apprenticeships are available sporadically throughout the
country. One example is the Minnesota Next Generation Nursing Assistant Initiative.
● Part-time and flexible trainings encourage career advancement and reduce turnover. For
example, Monroe Community College designed a part-time, jobsite LPN course for CNAs.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Recommended steps to target and attract talent and develop careers paths:
● Work with OPM to revise the pay plan for the Nursing Job Family, to create competitive pay
and offer a career ladder for nurses interested in state government employment.
● Establish working group with OPM stakeholders and ADVA leadership to research creating a
tiered pay system and/or lead workers for challenging to fill positions to develop career paths
within the VA homes to open opportunities for advancement and enhance skills
development. The VA homes could request more flexibility in their budget since the homes
are self-funded through Medicare, Medicaid, VA per diem rates, private insurance, and private
pay.
● Implement the special compensation awards outlined in Act 172 passed in the 2024
legislative session to attract nurses and CNAs.
● Conduct a detailed current state assessment of ADVA talent and career development in
veteran homes including existing professional development opportunities and current skills
needs.
● Further assess current critical areas for ADVA talent and career development, such as
Employee Value Proposition for roles with high reliance on external contractors and
forecasting of future skills needs.
● Develop and launch an employee survey to understand current satisfaction, interest in
different roles and training topics, and creating a success profile of tenured and high
performing staff.
● Analyze survey results and current state assessment to create a list of training and career
development priorities for employees in veteran homes.
● Establish working group with OPM stakeholders and ADVA leadership to research and
promote continuing education tuition reimbursement and financial incentives for veterans’
home CNAs and LPNs.
● Apply to the U.S. Department of Veterans’ Administration for federal funds to create a
financial incentive for CNAs and nurses.
● Develop a mentorship program for CNAs and LPNs that have a desire to advance their career.
● Conduct a comprehensive compensation analysis of ADVA nursing (RN & LPN) and CNA jobs
to similar private and public sector jobs and a comparative market study by position type with
like size states.
● Identify new sources of talent by creating partnerships with high schools, technical schools,
and universities, and develop strategies to engage with these sources.
● Develop financial and non-financial recruiting incentives to attract new talent, such as
signing bonuses, relocation assistance, and flexible work arrangements; adjust policies as
needed.
● Develop a strategic marketing and recruitment plan that contains a complete profile of the
ideal candidate, a more creative and targeted analysis of the best places to source for talent,
and positive branding and messaging to promote positive occupational awareness about
working in ADVA home.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
● Develop and deploy a community awareness campaign to increase understanding and
desirability of helping veterans as a career.
● Monitor and evaluate the effectiveness of the talent targeting and attraction strategies and
career development programs. Use data analytics and performance metrics to assess the
impact of the changes and identify areas for further improvement.
● Communicate pay rates as a salary, but also as salary and benefits combined, reminding
applicants of the true compensation value.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Based on interviews with
ADVA leadership, ADVA will need to collaborate with OPM to support this initiative to build career
paths, develop specialized training, create tuition reimbursement opportunities, and a tiered salary
structure to retain hard to fill positions.
Estimation of department priorities with staffing and resources: Based on the
unique funding of the ADVA homes (revenue from Medicare, Medicaid, VA, private insurance, and
self-pay), ADVA currently has budget to increase salaries and reduce their reliance on outside
contractors for staffing needs. ADVA expects that the initiative can be accomplished through existing
appropriations and revenue generated from their long-term care VA homes. It is anticipated existing
OPM staff would coordinate these new initiatives.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
New recruiting tactics, partnerships, tuition reimbursement, tiered pay, and hiring incentives will
build tenure and development of staff to help employees learn or strengthen skills; increase
confidence, motivation and productivity. To retain skilled employees and develop future leaders, it is
critical to understand employee career objectives and align them with organizational goals. This
initiative enables both recruitment strategies and career development to help employees gain new
skills and improve retention at the ADVA homes.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: Proposed metrics
to assess the impact of this initiative include:
• Staff position vacancy rate (expected to decrease)
• Rate of employee satisfaction (expected to increase);
• Percentage of positions filled (expected to increase);
• Turnover rate (expected to decrease);
• Increased number of job applicants (expected to increase); and,
• Improved patient satisfaction scores (expected to increase).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: Cost savings and cost avoidance opportunities could be captured in the
future, reduced costs related to overtime and contract staffing, reduced costs related to staff
turnover, reduced overall cost from contracted staff in key areas, and increased retention. As
highlighted in the recommendations section, this initiative could be accompanied by an upfront
initial appropriations authority and investment to enhance salaries in the mission critical areas
identified: nursing and CNAs in the veterans’ homes.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Change Management Plan: Clear communication with staff about the purpose for the
changes should accompany any information on the new process changes. Recommended
messaging and modalities are included for each audience in Figure 10. Key activities and timing for
communication plan are included in Appendix A – ADVA Work Plan.
Figure 10 – ADVA - 6 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
All Staff ADVA is embarking on a plan to recruit new Staff Email HR Director
staff and develop career paths through Division Directors
specialized training, mentorship, and tuition Leadership
reimbursement.
This will support employee development,
retention, and improve the patient
experience.
This investment will help ADVA better fulfill its
mission.
All Staff ADVA specialized training subject matter Staff Email HR Director
areas Staff Bulletins Division Directors
ADVA Mentoring program creates Staff Announcements Leadership
opportunities for CNAs and LPNs. Staff Meetings
ADVA-07: Increase Public Knowledge of Benefits for Veterans
This initiative seeks to increase public knowledge of benefits available for veterans in Arkansas.
ADVA will lead educational action to bring awareness of the federal and state benefits, high quality
long-term nursing care and burial honors available for veterans. Through community partnerships
and communication channels, actionable strategies will be created and implemented to promote
the increase of service utilization of ADVA benefits available to eligible veterans statewide. The
Veterans’ Services Division aims to implement this initiative in alignment with the identification of
areas needed to build long-term talent systems.
Initiative Overview and Current State: ADVA embodies a core tradition of “ADVAcacy”
through its VSO Network, providing access across nine state districts. District Veteran Service
Offices are available to provide direct support to County Veteran Service Officers, however there are
limited DVSO positions statewide (13 positions, with 2 vacancies).
ADVA estimates over 200,000 veterans reside in Arkansas, while 10,000 receive ADVA services. ADVA
has no marketing budget or other resources dedicated to promoting awareness of services. Because
of this budget gap, there is a lack of awareness of available services and benefits in the veteran
community. ADVA needs a marketing strategy beyond the VSO network, as the primary method to
engage veterans today is through word of mouth. ADVA has an authorized Public Affairs Officer
position, but this position has been vacant for approximately one year.
Rationale: ADVA needs an integrated strategy to bring community awareness to the services and
resources available for veterans residing in Arkansas. Underutilization of services is primarily due to
veterans either not understanding of the benefits available and or lacking knowledge of the process
to apply for these benefits. ADVA will consider partnering with division stakeholders such as the
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Department of Health (Division of Public Health), and Department of Human Services, to expand
effective communications and bring awareness of military benefits available to increase service
utilization.
Implementation Considerations:
Several other states and the federal government have used innovative marketing strategies to
promote available veteran benefits, in addition to conducting many effective public service
campaigns on topics such as veterans’ mental health, suicide prevention, employment, among
others:
• South Dakota: Implemented an “Operating Reaching All Veterans” project in 2024. South
Dakota Department of Veterans’ Affairs set a goal to identify and make contact with every
veteran in the state and used multiple strategies including open houses, telephone outreach,
print/mail outreach.11
• Florida: The Department of Veterans’’ Affairs partnered with Public Broadcasting Service to
air announcements following veteran-related programming to raise awareness of FDVA and
available earned benefits. The PSAs aired before and after 7 PBS documentaries in 2014-
2015 on Florida’s nine PBS stations. Over 1.1 million households watched the programming
and Florida experienced a 20% increase in veterans receiving benefits.12
• Utah: The Utah Department of Veterans and Military Affairs (UDVMA) partnered with the
Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) to identify veterans and send outbound postcard
outreach to them about programming. 13
• Michigan: In 2023, the state launched a video series that documents individual stories of
veterans. The outreach and awareness campaign named “I Served. I am a Veteran,”14 was
funded by the state to connect veterans to the benefits and resources they earned for serving.
Each story highlighted shares the adversities and triumphs of local veterans each with
different backgrounds connecting them to benefits so they can thrive.
A case study from the Miami-Dade Public Library System (Florida) may also prove instructive for
ADVA, particularly in using multiple low-cost channels to engage veterans. The Miami-Dade
Public Library System developed strategies to create awareness of library services. The
strategies deployed provide valuable insight on how to maximize low-cost channels to expand
the impact of awareness campaigns.
Through their research, they discovered that the public did not access their local libraries because
they were not fully aware of the latest and non-traditional services offered to them. They used
various strategies to create brand
11
Institute for Veterans and Military Families, “INNOVATION IN STATE-LEVEL VETERANS SERVICES: A Comprehensive
Review, Case Highlights, and an Agenda for Enhanced State Impact,” July 2019, https://nyhealthfoundation.org/wp-
content/uploads/2019/07/IVMF-innovation-in-state-level-veterans-services.pdf.
12
Institute for Veterans and Military Families, 2019.
13
Institute for Veterans and Military Families, 2019.
14
Michigan veterans from all backgrounds tell their stories
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A case study from the Miami-Dade Public Library System (Florida) may also prove instructive for
ADVA, particularly in using multiple low-cost channels to engage veterans. The Miami-Dade
Public Library System developed strategies to create awareness of library services. The strategies
deployed provide valuable insight on how to maximize low-cost channels to expand the impact of
awareness campaigns.
Through their research, they discovered that the public did not access their local libraries because
they were not fully aware of the latest and non-traditional services offered to them. They used
various strategies to create brand loyalty for customers to see the library as the best resource to
meet their needs and become a reoccurring customer, with channels shown in Figure 11.15
Figure 11 – Modalities to Deliver the Message
Strategy Expected Outcome
Advertising Used allocated funding to expand printing and electronic media. Consider
using multiple channels like social media, radio, billboards, website, and
collateral handout materials.
Community Outreach Collaboration with community leaders and organizations to develop trusting
partnerships who will help share information about the many resources the
library has to offer.
E-mail Subscription Subscribers stayed connected and received regular updates about library
Services programming, services and current events.
Mobile Applications Customers connected with the library and access to the many services
available to them.
Print Collateral Fliers, posters and brochures were used to promote the library programs and
services. These resources were distributed through community partnerships
and used during outreach events.
Public Relations Program information, services and current events were shared through press
releases to media outlets. The library also created a dedicated public
information offer who led all marketing initiatives like a public relations
campaign, speech writing, press kits, and power point presentations.
Social media Used social media consistently to share and update information about the
program, services and events. Photos were shared about events taking place
at the library to create interest and promote services available. Platforms
used are Facebook, twitter, and Pinterest. The library did dedicate a staff
person to manage its social media footprint.
Staff Development The library provided in-house trainings, webinars, workshops and conferences
to keep staff informed about library resources, services and programs so they
could provide a five-star customer experience. They relied on their customer
service delivery to produce positive word of mouth promotion to gain new
customers.
Videos Videos were used in community outreach events and shared on the website to
highlight programs and resources offered.
Website A new website was launched to provide fresh content and increase user
interface. The website allowed users to access the library catalog,
subscription databases, calendar of events, latest news and press releases
and eBooks, music and magazines available for download.
Source: Mayor’s Blue Ribbon Task Force for the Miami-Dade Public Library System.
15
Awareness, Advocacy, and Marketing Working Group, “Strategies to Create Awareness of Library Services,”
AAM7 Strategies to Create Awareness of Library Services.pdf (miamidade.gov).
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
Despite use of new communication channels, there is a risk that the targeted audience may not be
reached. However, research on health prevention and promotion public awareness efforts has found
that awareness campaigns can be effective but require dedicated time and resources for community
engagement, support recipients to overcome barriers in accessing services and maintaining an open
approach for community-based partnerships to promote a culture shift.16
To increase effectiveness of any public awareness campaign, ADVA should consult examples such
as that of the FRIENDS National Center:17
● A specific message purpose. The awareness campaign will try to influence specific actions
and behaviors such as expanding the knowledge of military benefits to increase the number
of eligible veterans who can receive military benefits.
● Understanding the communication impact. The communication message will call for
action because the goal is to increase the number of benefit applicants completed and
submitted to identify eligible veterans who can access services.
● Using tailored messaging. Use language context, values and resources that veteran
communities understand. The messages should use the voice of the customer. The
campaign should consider using the role of family members and support system play for a
veteran to help relay information or help them get connected with ADVA.
A September 2024 ADVA staff focus group identified some ongoing challenges to increase awareness
of ADVA’s services including a lack of marketing budget, no dedicated person to lead public
engagement and to actively engage social media platforms; and lack of VSO staff available with only
13 statewide positions, two of which remain vacant. Considerations to mitigate risks and enabling
success include:
● Exploring free marketing opportunities to expand message potential. Partner with trusted
business and community organizations who can help spread ADVAs message to increase
awareness and can help drive action to increase applications to be submitted for benefit
eligibility. Ask if they are willing to display ADVA messaging and the application link on their
business website, if they can display visuals in their office or will include
campaign/partnership messaging in their business interactions with their customers.
● Evaluating opportunities within the state government to promote a connection to ADVA, for
example; State Revenue Offices and Local Health Units to display ADVA signage for family
members to learn how they can help connect their veteran family members. Utilizing health
care campaigns within the Department of Human Services and the Department of Health to
mention VSO accessibility for veterans with immediate steps on how to connect with ADVA.
● Filling and utilizing the Public Affairs Officer position as the dedicated point of contact and
lead for all marketing campaign efforts and social media outlets. Prioritize efforts to recruit
and fill qualified candidates.
16
Public Health Institute, 2022.
17
FRIENDS National Center for Community-Based Child Abuse Prevention, “Are Public Awareness
Campaigns Effective?” Are Public Awareness Campaigns Effective? - Friends NRC
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
● Exploring partnerships with universities for interns and collaborative projects. For example,
Walton School of Business could be a partner to assist with marketing campaigns and create
an internship position for a social media lead.
● Using communication channels that are low cost and have high volume proven impact (i.e.,
social media, radio).
● Promoting VSO vacancies across ADVA’s program areas such as with families of residents of
ADVA’s veterans homes and families accessing ADVA cemetery benefits and utilizing
community/business partnerships that promote ADVA’s awareness campaign to also share
employment potential within ADVA to help support the veteran community.
Recommended steps for increasing the number of veterans eligible to receive ADVA services
(future state):
● Complete a current state assessment of ADVA’s public reach – Gather details of ADVA’s
public reach through existing communication channels (website traffic, social media
presence and outlets for printed materials. Cross reference communication reach against
current percentage of eligible veterans receiving benefits within the state.
● Facilitate surveys to veterans – Utilize surveys to gain insight as to how veterans utilizing
services learned about ADVA programs.
● Modify benefit awareness marketing messaging – Simplify marketing messages to engage
veterans to apply for available benefits. Provide clarity on ADVA program accessibility in
Arkansas compared to ADVA spending in other states. Create a one page brochure that
explains the difference between county, state and federal benefits.
● Analyze survey data to identify new communication methods to pursue – Review survey data
collections to determine high impact communication channels and methods to magnify
veteran reach (VFW posts, online chat rooms, and veteran publications, etc.)
● Develop an integrated media strategy – Formalize a detailed plan to tailor key messages
utilizing the most effective channels of communication available. Consider impact and
return on investment for upgrading websites, print resources, VSOs and social media efforts
to communicate benefit resources and the process for accessibility.
● Implement the media strategy – Execute detailed actions within the designated time frames
and ensure accountable parties are consistently communicating for a successful launch.
● Evaluate and align ongoing efforts of communication needed - Ensure accountability and
consistent checkpoints to review the integrated media strategy is executing desired results
and impact through key performance indicators.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative aligns
with the need to build long-term talent systems to increase the volume of veterans eligible to access
military benefits in Arkansas.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
This initiative is not expected to result in changes to how ADVA administers benefits.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
This initiative will increase public awareness on veteran benefits and seeks to increase the number
applications for services as well as service utilization of eligible veterans.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Performance Measures to be tracked:
● The number and methods of communication channels utilized for marketing (increase
expected);
● Volume of reach through each communication channel used (e.g., website views, social
media likes) (increase expected);
● The number of benefit applications submitted post launch of marketing campaign (increase
expected); and,
● Service utilization rate for ADVA services post launch of marketing campaign (increase
expected).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: This initiative is not expected to result in a cost savings.
ADVA requires financial support to create a marketing strategy as there are little to no branding
resources available. There is a pending legislative request for $10,000 that could help expedite the
launch of this awareness campaign for marketing materials and communication platforms.
ADVA also needs a full-time Public Affairs Officer to lead all communications and marketing efforts
within ADVA. Hiring a full-time employee to be dedicated to these efforts would ensure continuous
focus on this project. There is no recurring financial impact to support communication or marketing,
but if the campaign is effective, it is expected to have an indeterminate cost to ADVA’s programs.
Change Management Plan: This initiative is not expected to require a change management
plan. The initiative seeks to develop a communication strategy for engaging veterans.
Standardized messaging and communications across ADVA will be critical to enhance promotion of
service offerings for veteran communities. As the communication strategy plan is being created,
consideration for key messaging elements could include:
● We created an integrated strategy for community awareness on our benefits because we
want to increase the number of eligible Veterans that can access services.
● We are looking for communication platforms with proven high-volume impact to obtain
statewide reach within the veteran community.
● We are exploring new ways to bring awareness using new platforms of radio, social media
and community partnerships.
● We need trusted partners in business and community organizations that can help us expand
our reach to the veteran community statewide.
● We need your help to spread the word on our efforts and the importance of our work to help
get Veterans to complete the benefit application for eligibility.
● We are also hiring vacant positions within VSO and Public Affairs, please share the job
postings with anyone you know who may be interested and meets the criteria.
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ADVA Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Strategic Management Plan:
Arkansas Department of the Military
Table of Contents
Table of Contents ................................................................................................................. 1
Overview ............................................................................................................................... 1
Recommended Organizational Structure .......................................................................... 2
How this Department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective future department ............... 3
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation...................................... 3
DOTM-01: Streamline information sharing in DOTM through federal-state integration ..................... 4
DOTM-02: Optimize payroll accuracy for the National Guard through digitization ........................... 12
DOTM-03: Accelerate and optimize document routing process ......................................................... 16
DOTM-04 - Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and efficiency ....................... 24
DOTM-05: Maximize federal funding opportunities through re-configured state funding ................ 24
Overview
The Arkansas Department of the Military (DOTM) operates a professional staff of state employees
who maintain and improve the readiness of Arkansas National Guard units. DOTM’s objective is to
provide ready, trained, and responsive community-based units that support the State and defend
the Nation. State employees work alongside federal employees, forming a unique organizational
structure that exists to:
• Promote National Guard individual and unit readiness through effective use of state
resources;
• Provide excellent customer service; and,
• Provide guidance and assistance in the management of state resources.
Through the Arkansas Forward project, a 2024 initiative to improve the efficiency and effectiveness
of Arkansas’ 15 cabinet-level departments, DOTM prioritized implementation of five initiatives that
improve operations, including to remove systems access hurdles that impact the ability of the
federal and state employees to collaborate.
This Strategic Management Plan (“Plan”) memorializes the work completed by DOTM during
Arkansas Forward, translating the department’s vision into a plan consisting of recommended
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
organizational structure, key initiatives prioritized for immediate implementation, and related
performance metrics. A companion project plan (“Work Plan”) provides a more detailed resource to
support implementation of the initiatives by DOTM’s Arkansas Forward project management team.
Recommended Organizational Structure
DOTM’s current organization chart is shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1 – Current Organizational Structure
Note: Organization Chart does not display federal employees.
As part of Arkansas Forward, DOTM’s structure was reviewed to identify opportunities for redesign
in three areas:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission;
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives; and,
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions (i.e.,
information technology, human resources, procurement).
Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission: No organization chart
changes were identified to better help the department achieve its mission. All employees that can
report to the Chief of Staff do so at this time; the Museum Manager reports to the Adjunct Deputy
General (because this role serves as the chair of the museum board). Further managerial changes
within the organization are not entirely within state authority, as many of the department’s
supervisory positions are federal employees and factors such as team size are not determined solely
by state leaders.
Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives: The most pressing
change that would support the efficiency of DOTM’s unique state-federal employee organization
structure is not an organization structure change, but instead, is to improve federal-state system
integration and address system barriers that prevent federal managerial employees from accessing
state email and payroll systems, among others. Major progress has been made in this area and is a
“quick win” for the department, with significant potential to improve the efficiency of the
department’s operations (see DOTM-01).
Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ move to deliver certain functions through shared services
functions: Based on direction from the Steering Committee, Transformation and Shared Services
(TSS) will assume responsibility for the Payroll and Help Desk functions statewide, as the first
Human Resources and Information Technology functions to transfer to TSS in a statewide shared
services model. Additional decisions on sequencing of further functions have not yet been
determined.
At this time, the recommendation for DOTM’s future state organization is to continue the current
organization structure, as included in Figure 1.
How this Department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective
future department
DOTM has a unique organization structure, with both state and federal employees. Rather than
choosing to focus on how to reorganize, DOTM identified multiple initiatives as part of Arkansas
Forward to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of its operations, given this structure, including
improving federal-state information sharing, improving the accuracy of the payroll process, and
optimizing document routing. These operational improvements will improve collaboration and
effectiveness of the existing organizational design.
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward
Implementation
DOTM leadership generated nine ideas to improve the departmental effectiveness and efficiency,
before prioritizing five initiatives for immediate implementation as part of Arkansas Forward that
focus on improving operational performance.
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
DOTM-01: Streamline information sharing in DOTM through federal-state
integration
This initiative aims to unify federal and state information technology applications where different
processes cause issues. Develop a solution to either integrate DOTM federal employees into state
systems and programs (e.g., AASIS and EASE) or create a new secure data transfer portal.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DOTM has a unique organizational structure, which
includes state and federal employees. Federal employees serve in many supervisory roles, in which
they oversee state staff across functions such as: police, facilities, maintenance, building and
grounds, and fire desk, among others.
DOTM-01 was established to address the inefficiencies and challenges arising from the disparate IT
systems used by federal and state staff. A primary challenge identified by staff is that federal
employees cannot access state systems and do not have access to a state email account, which is
a prerequisite for certain system access. Examples of impacted systems include:
• Arkansas Administrative Statewide Information System (AASIS): This system is
administered by the Department of Finance and Administration (DFA) and is used by all state
departments for financial, human resources, and procurement operations. Managers can
use this system to approve time and leave requests for employees.
• Empowering Arkansas State Employees (EASE): This system is administered by the DFA and
is used by state employees to manage a variety of functions (i.e., view and print paystubs,
review state benefits plans, view their contact information as displayed in AASIS) and for
managers to conduct Performance Management.
The result of this lack of access is that federal managers cannot approve time/leave, enter the results
of employee evaluations, or otherwise perform routine management tasks, and such tasks must be
completed by DOTM Human Resources staff. The existing process is resource intensive, time-
consuming, and risks human error, as documentation must be manually entered into state systems.
More broadly, the lack of a unified, automated system for federal and state employees to use, or
integration between the separate state and federal systems, creates numerous challenges for
efficient agency operations, including:
• Lack of integration between federal Department of Defense (DOD) and state systems creates
challenges transferring data, often resulting in time-consuming and unsecure email
exchanges. Additionally, DOTM users face the cumbersome process of manually transferring
files between systems using dual credentials, which staff estimate can take significant time
for a single file.
• Because the data to run processes (such as for payroll) are maintained in multiple Excel
spreadsheets, multiple people cannot work simultaneously.
• Difficulties with data sharing have resulted in operational practices that are highly manual, which
creates inefficiencies and bottlenecks. As an example, workarounds, such as manual crosswalks,
have been developed. DOTM converts the federal data into an AASIS-compatible format using a
manual crosswalk. The crosswalks serve as the guide for staff to be able to determine which
AASIS accounts match the federal appendices. The federal appendices and sub-appendices could
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
have 300 lines of accounting each, easily surpassing 5,000 total lines. Each purchase must be
found on both sides of the crosswalk, requiring a significant expenditure of staff time for each
item.
Figure 2 provides a process map for the “current state” of the cooperative agreement process, which
reflects a process that has been designed around a lack of access to AASIS for federal employees
and an inability to share data files with employee and reimbursement information. The cooperative
agreements cover essentially all interactions between the state and federal governments except for
State Active Duty which is under its own processes and agreements. State Active Duty processes
are addressed in DOTM-03.
Figure 2 – Current Cooperative Agreement Process Map
Source: Developed in work session with DOTM staff held on September 4, 2024.
Rationale: The initiative aims to develop solutions that integrate federal DOTM employees into
state systems/programs and create a new secure data transfer portal. These efforts are expected to
result in greater automation of processes, reduction in manual data entry, streamlining of
workflows, and improvements in data transfer between federal and state systems.
To achieve more efficient and effective collaboration between federal and state agencies, DOTM
should pursue data sharing solutions and/or system integration which would support process
improvement. A platform that enables direct file sharing and integrates with current and future state
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
systems administered by DFA (i.e., S4HANA, an enterprise resource planning “ERP” software tool
planned for implementation as the AASIS replacement), would significantly reduce processing time
and improve accuracy by eliminating the need for manual crosswalks.
The benefits of such a system are substantial, including faster turnaround times, fewer errors,
enhanced security, and streamlined workflows. To realize this vision, DOTM should conduct a
thorough evaluation of available solutions, collaborate closely with federal and state agencies, and
implement a pilot program to gather valuable feedback.
As an intermediate step, providing federal employees access to select state systems such as AASIS
would facilitate more hands-on management by the federal supervisors supervising state staff. This
would reduce manual administrative processes to perform functions such as entering employee
evaluations into state systems, which is manual and prone to error.
Implementation Considerations:
Implementing “quick win” to provide system access to federal employees:
As part of Arkansas Forward, DOTM has engaged Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and DFA
and obtained permission to provide AASIS access to DOTM’s federal employees. DOTM has agreed
to provide connectivity to buildings previously lacking it and computers for federal employees and is
seeking federal financial participation for the ongoing software costs, estimated to be $400-
$450/person (for Microsoft 365 and AASIS license costs, among other costs). DOTM has not yet
received confirmation if DOD will assume these costs. Two federal employees have been provided
access, as “pilot” cases before all federal employees receive access.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success of data integration:
DOTM staff participated in a facilitated session and identified some of the potential barriers for
improving data integration (shown as the goal in the blue box), summarized in Figure 3 (known as an
interference diagram). Each of the obstacles are shown in red boxes, with related solutions in green
boxes. Some of the primary obstacles include:
• There is a need to obtain a new accounts payable and receivable (AP&R) system that allows
cross-domain information transfer and can integrate with AASIS.
• Once federal users have access to AASIS and further data integration is possible, DOTM will
need to replace the manual and varied processes in place as workarounds today with
standard operating procedures for the new processes performed across all appendices
(federal employees).
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 3 – DOTM-01 Interference Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with DOTM staff held on September 4, 2024.
Recommended Steps for Establishing the Future State:
• Provide federal government access to AASIS (complete):
o Provide training: Train federal employees on how to use AASIS effectively and
efficiently.
• Install fiber connections to impacted buildings: (in progress)
o Conduct a network assessment: Assess the current state of the network
infrastructure to identify areas where fiber connections are needed.
o Prioritize locations: Determine the buildings and computers that require fiber
connections based on their criticality and data transfer needs.
o Coordinate with IT providers: Work with IT service providers to plan and execute the
installation of fiber connections.
• Evaluate and select an accounts payable and receivable system:
o In approximately six months, re-evaluate the current state to review the impact of
providing federal access. If the solution is fully effective, more action may be
unnecessary. If it is not fully meeting the needs of the Department, consider altering
access or proceeding with the remaining action steps.
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
o Define requirements: Clearly articulate the specific needs and functionalities
required for an accounts payable and receivable system.
o Research and compare options: Evaluate various commercial and open-source
solutions based on their features, cost, and compatibility with DOTM's existing
systems.
o Conduct a pilot implementation: Test selected systems in a controlled environment
to assess their performance and suitability.
• Develop integration plan:
o Map current processes: Document the existing accounts payable and receivable
processes to identify areas for integration.
o Plan data migration: Develop a strategy for transferring data from the current
systems to the new accounts payable and receivable system.
o Address compatibility issues: Identify and resolve any compatibility issues between
the new system and existing DOTM systems.
• Implement the new system:
o Provide training: Train employees on how to use the new system effectively.
o Phased rollout: Implement the system gradually to minimize disruption and allow
for adjustments.
o Monitor performance: Continuously monitor the system's performance and address
any issues that arise.
• Optimize the new process:
o Gather feedback: Collect feedback from users to identify areas for improvement.
o Make updates and enhancements: Implement updates and enhancements to the
system based on user feedback and changing requirements.
o Expand integration: Explore opportunities to integrate the accounts payable and
receivable system with other DOTM systems for further efficiency gains if
applicable.
Figure 4 provides process enhancements, with federal system connectivity and other automation
enhancements. Steps that demonstrate improvement over the current process due to automation
are added in red.
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 4 – DOTM-1 Future State Map
Source: Developed in work session with DOTM staff held on September 4, 2024.
Alignment of Department priorities with staffing and resources: Staff currently has
the resources to complete the quick win portion of the initiative.
DOTM has already piloted the federal access solution and has decided to proceed with broader
access. DOTM will need to expand access to additional federal employees after fiber connections
have been established to all 14 locations. DOTM is willing and able to pay the cost for these
connections if the federal government does not provide funding.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: Significant process changes for federal employees are possible from the quick win of
providing system access for federal employees. It is anticipated they would be able to perform
payroll, performance evaluations, and a number of managerial functions as state managers do today
and would require training on these systems and process to be successful.
DOTM enhance other processes based on data integration. This initiative offers an opportunity to
review existing processes (such as through process mapping) and contemplate efficiencies
achievable through automation, which can impact the future state. This initiative mapped the
cooperative agreement process but DOTM could use this strategy for other purposes
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: To effectively
measure the success of the initiative, DOTM leadership should implement a comprehensive set of
metrics that track various aspects of the initiative's goals. These metrics can help assess the
efficiency, accuracy, user satisfaction, cost-effectiveness, and security of the new system or
process. By monitoring these metrics, DOTM can identify areas for improvement and ensure that the
initiative is delivering the desired outcomes.
Process Efficiency and Timeliness
• Average turnaround time for data transfers: Measures the speed and efficiency of the new
system or process (expected to decrease);
• Reduction in manual steps: Quantifies the decrease in manual tasks and processes (expected to
decrease); and,
• Number of backlogs or delays: Indicates the system's ability to handle workload and avoid
bottlenecks (expected to decrease).
Cost Savings
• Reduction in manual labor costs: Quantifies the savings from automating or streamlining
processes (expected to decrease);
• Savings from reduced errors and rework: Measures the financial benefits of improved data
accuracy and efficiency (savings expected to increase);
• Return on investment (ROI) of the initiative: Calculates the financial benefits of the initiative
compared to the costs.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: There are significant savings associated with this initiative. In the
cooperative agreement process alone there are many redundant, manual processes and steps that
could be quickly and substantially streamlined with the introduction of an automated workflow. The
federal budget manager takes two weeks per month at near full time dedication requests into the
various cooperative agreements and appendices. This would be reduced by 50% with the interaction
in this system if not more. The accounting coordinator spends 95% of their time for a 3-week period
every month separating payroll into the cooperative agreements and appendices this time would be
cut down to one week as well, a reduction of 66%.
Change Management Plan: This initiative will require support from other Arkansas
departments (TSS and DFA) (already secured), and DOD to be successful. Communication and
training for federal employees will be required to support their successful use of state systems.
Messaging and modalities recommended for each audience are included in Figure 5.
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 5 – ADOM-01 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Responsible Party
DOD ● DOTM seeks greater ● Face-to-face and virtual Jeff Wood, COS
data integration with meetings. Brian Melton, CIO
its federal partner -
ideal is to create a
secure data portal.
● Lack of integration
creates challenges
transferring data.
● Difficulties with data
sharing have resulted
in operational
practices that are
highly manual, which
creates inefficiencies
and bottlenecks.
Federal ● To enhance your ability ● Virtual meeting/town Jeff Wood, COS
employees to manage your staff hall. Brian Melton, CIO
and engage with ● Email.
Arkansas state
employees, you have
been provided access
to several systems
previously only
available to state
employees.
● These systems include
AASIS and EASE [insert
description of
functionality].
● Training will be
provided to enable you
to use these tools
effectively [insert
timeline and process
for training].
● We anticipate
additional process
improvements will be
possible given greater
system access and
integration of data
between the two
departments and will
update you as needed
on these efforts.
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
DOTM-02: Optimize payroll accuracy for the National Guard through
digitization
This initiative directs the Arkansas Department of the Military to digitize manual elements of the
National Guard (NG) payroll system. This digitization will reduce manual processing errors that
currently lead to pay delays, errors, and overpayments.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DOTM processes payroll payments for National
Guard service members called to active duty. Currently this process is manual. Key payment
information is written on a state form and the data entered in Excel by DOTM employees.
Approximately 100 individuals, including civilian staff, utilize the payment system. The Excel
spreadsheet is used to generate a batch file, which is transmitted to the state’s financial system.
The existing manual processes are prone to error, which can result in payment delays, erroneous
data entry, and under or overpayments. As an example, in a recent disaster when a tornado struck
Arkansas the Governor called 198 service members to active duty. In processing payments for this
group, an employee noticed an error and tried to correct it. This effort shifted multiple rows of
payment information which resulted in numerous errors and overpayments. The employee corrected
the single error, but it resulted in other errors and many service members did not receive their
appropriate payment. Errors of this magnitude may not occur often, however, errors during a
payment cycle are common. Recently, about twenty service members have experienced some error
in their payment; as an example, a small number did not receive their direct deposit and were issued
paper checks.
Rationale: DOTM is seeking an automated solution to generate these payments. The Department
has five manual processes that they wish to automate. These processes include:
• On-boarding of service members onto State Active Duty;
• Automating payroll information such as bank routing number, bank account type, and state
and federal withholdings;
• Automating payment;
• Automating reimbursement process with respect to purchases made in support of the
mission; and,
• Automating the audit trail.
Having active-duty National Guard service members paid accurately and timely is essential to
maintaining morale and readiness. Disruptions in pay and erroneous payments negatively impact
the well-being of service members and can create distractions from the tasks at hand and shift focus
to concern for their family’s economic well-being.
Implementation Considerations:
There are approximately twelve state National Guard agencies that use an automated solution for
payroll. One of the most common solutions is a product called ARRO (Activate, Respond, Recovery,
and Operate). ARRO allows emergency response organizations and state national guards to replace
manual and paper-based operations related to personnel, pay, and equipment tracking. Florida is
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
an example of a state currently using this product and DOTM is planning a site visit in Fall 2024 to
see a demonstration.
The work plan outlined below provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with DOTM staff and review of best practices include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
The success of the initiative will be dependent on identifying risks, mitigating these risks, and ensuing
strategies that enable success. The following risks, mitigation, and strategies identified to date are:
• Digital information, especially Personal Identifiable Information (PII), can be subject to
security risks and breaches. Assessing and meeting DOD and state data privacy policies,
procedures, and regulations, as well as delineating clear guidelines for all users, and
regularly conducting privacy and security audits will mitigate this risk.
• Insufficient training and skill gaps could prevent successful implementation of a new payroll
system. Engaging users early mitigates this risk, as well as conducting a comprehensive
needs assessment to identify skill gaps, delivering targeted training to upskill employees,
and provide ongoing support and resources.
Recommended steps for establishing DOTM-2:
• Form a payroll modernization committee to define detailed requirements and specifications.
• Engage TSS for support with procurement for payroll system. Issue request for proposal (RFP)
outlining specific requirements for digitization, including data migration, security, and
compliance needs.
• Appoint a Project Manager.
• Conduct interviews and demonstrations with selected vendors. Negotiate contract terms,
including deliverables, timelines, and support agreements.
• Design data migration blueprint and ensure robust security protocols to protect sensitive
payroll information during and after the migration process.
• Define specific performance measure metrics.
• Design and conduct a skill gap needs assessment.
• Design use cases for testing and a change management template.
• Ensure implementation of auditing procedures within the new payroll system. Conduct a
series of internal audits to verify the accuracy and reliability of payroll data.
• Create or use detailed user manuals, step-by-step guides, and tutorials tailored to the new
system or process.
• Develop and implement Communication Plan.
• Develop a customer service plan and establish a help desk.
• Develop a training plan and training module.
• Schedule and conduct comprehensive training sessions for payroll administrators, finance
officers, and other relevant personnel.
• If necessary, plan and schedule the full-scale data migration, ensuring minimal disruption to
regular payroll operations.
• Conduct user acceptance testing and payment reconciliation.
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Regularly review system performance metrics and user feedback to identify opportunities for
optimization.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: DOTM exists to
support the needs of the National Guard. Its mission is to maintain and improve the readiness of
Arkansas National Guard units by employing fiduciary management of state resources, excellent
human resources, and quality administration of the National Guard programs. To ensure its
responsibilities and to meet one of the foremost needs of activated National Guard service
members, an initiative to better automate its payroll system and to accurately pay those who serve
aligns well with the goals of the department.
To ensure success this initiative requires collaboration between the Department of Military Support
(DOMS), the department Human Resource staff, staff from Information Management, the US
Property and Fiscal Office, and TSS’s Office of Personnel Management. Since security is another key
priority for the DOTM, a dedicated implementation team will examine the ability of various digital
payroll platforms to meet federal and state security requirements.
DOTM will need to seek financial resources to procure, implement, and maintain the software
product chosen as its payroll platform.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: Introduction of automation will transform the existing payroll process and DPTM will need
new departmental operating procedures. DOTM should leverage the opportunity of introducing
automation to conduct process mapping of the payroll process to improve the process (in contrast
to automating the current process only). DOTM will need to train the administrative staff and the
service members using the automated payment process. DOTM will need to train service members
on completing time sheets, identifying banking information for auto deposits, identifying tax
withholding information, and expense reports as applicable.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
results of the initiative are to decrease pay delays, prevent over/under payments, and reduce overall
payroll processing time.
Recommended performance measures are:
• Payroll accuracy rate (expected to increase);
• Number of employees with payroll disruptions (expected to decrease);
• Payroll processing time (in days) and,
• Payroll timeliness to pay employee (in days).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: Based on initial estimates, DOTM-02 has the potential positive annual
reoccurring financial impact of $98,000, which includes cost savings/cost avoidance opportunities
that could be captured in the future. If the initiative captures this value, the savings could be used to
offset financial resources needed to procure, implement, and maintain the software product chosen
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
as its payroll platform. This initiative could begin implementation in the fall of 2024 and completed
by June 2026.
There are some costs required for this initiative, including costs to purchase an automated system.
The estimated cost for implementation will range from $150,000 to $415,000 and dependent on
modules that are included in the product. Logistics, purchasing, travel, and mobile applications are
additional modules which are available to be purchased. The ongoing licensing cost could range
from $75,000 to $125,000. These costs are not currently budgeted nor eligible for a federal match
and would need to be requested by DOTM as part of their state appropriation.
A dedicated project manager will be critical for ensuring that staff are supported to meet deliverables
in a timely manner and project efforts stay on task.
Change Management Plan: Collaboration with state leadership, National Guard service
members, Office of Personnel Management, and among DOTM divisions is critical to this initiative.
Messaging and modalities recommended for each audience are included in Figure 6.
Figure 6 – ADOM-02 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities
National Guard Service ● Benefits of the new payment ● Departmental
Members system ● Staff meetings
● How to use the system ● Virtual meetings or roadshow
● Performance measures ● Memos
● Feedback from testing and ● Website
results
Office of Personal ● Benefits of new payment ● Virtual or face-to-face meetings
Management system ● Emails
● Payment System options
DOTM staff ● Benefits of the new payment ● Virtual or face-to-face meeting
system ● Emails
● How to preform automated ● Memos
administrative tasks
● Importance of privacy and
security
● Performance measures
● Feedback from testing and
results
● Payment system options
State Leadership ● Benefits of the new payment ● Virtual or face-to-face meeting
system ● Emails
● Cost and savings ● Memos
● Performance measures
● Feedback from testing and
results
● Payment system options
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
DOTM-03: Accelerate and optimize document routing process
This initiative directs DOTM to modernize the document routing process for all documents currently
processed manually (e.g., federal reimbursement, delivery orders, invoices, contracts); increase the
routing efficiency, accuracy, and speed by integrating advanced tracking and automation features;
and train users on new systems and reduce document processing time and errors.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DOTM is currently grappling with a cumbersome
document routing process that is hindering efficient operations. The primary issue is the reliance on
manual procedures, which leads to slow turnaround times, frequent errors, and a lack of visibility
into where a document is at any given point in the manual routing process. Documents are physically
transferred between divisions, resulting in delays, misplacements, and security risks. The manual
transfer of documents between state and federal accounts using self-email is particularly
problematic, as it can take up to 20 minutes per file. To illustrate this inefficiency, one process was
identified as an example. DOTM selected to focus on the State Active Duty payroll and expense
reimbursement process, through the federal form 270. The “270 process” involves manual handling
of paperwork and multiple steps for reimbursement. This process typically takes around two weeks
to complete, with significant delays caused by manual processing and need for coordination
between departments.
This method of document routing is having a detrimental impact on DOTM’s ability to function
efficiently. The slow processing times can impact critical decisions and lead to missed deadlines. Errors
in data entry and document handling can result in financial losses, compliance issues, and damage to
DOTM’s reputation. Additionally, the lack of visibility into document progress makes it difficult to
identify and address bottlenecks, further exacerbating inefficiencies.
Figure 7 provides a current state of the document routing process used between DOTM and DOD
for the State Active Duty reimbursement process.
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 7 – Current State Document Routing Process Map
Source: Developed in work session with DOTM staff held on September 4, 2024.
Rationale: This initiative would implement a new document routing solution. Modernizing the
document routing process is crucial for several reasons:
• Increased Efficiency: By integrating advanced tracking and automation features, the routing
process will become more streamlined, reducing the time it takes for documents to move
through the organization and providing visibility into where a document is at any point in the
routing process.
• Improved Accuracy: Manual processes are prone to errors, such as incorrect data entry or
lost documents. Automation can help minimize these errors and ensure the accuracy of
information.
• Enhanced Speed: A modernized document routing process will enable faster decision-
making and reduce processing time for critical documents.
• Reduced Costs: Streamlining processes and minimizing errors can lead to significant cost
savings.
• Better Compliance: Automation can help organizations comply with regulations and
standards that require accurate and timely document processing.
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Implementation Considerations:
DOTM should seek a workflow management tool to support modernization of workflows, including
supporting electronic document routing. This tool should support task automation, improvements
in data accuracy, and facilitate integration with other systems. Benefits DOTM could realize by
implementing such a tool include:
• Increased Efficiency: Streamlined workflows and reduced manual tasks lead to faster
response times and improved productivity.
• Enhanced Collaboration: Use of a workflow management tool facilitates better communication
and coordination between state and federal agencies.
• Improved Data Quality: Automated data entry and validation ensure accurate and reliable
information.
• Cost Savings: By reducing administrative burdens and eliminating redundant processes, use
of a workflow management tool can generate significant cost savings.
DOTM staff have already made the internal decision to consider a system for deployment in Arkansas
and will follow established procurement processes to consider appropriate vendors.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
DOTM staff participated in a facilitated session and identified some of the potential barriers for
improving the document routing process (shown as the goal in the blue box), summarized in Figure
8 (known as an interference diagram). Each of the obstacles are shown in red boxes, with related
solutions in green boxes. Some of the primary obstacles include:
• To overcome the difficulty communicating with personally identifiable information (PII),
which is governed by many federal requirements, some possible solutions include
implementing a secure messaging system specifically for internal communication, providing
training on how to use DOD SAFE effectively for communication, and exploring options for
integrating this communication system with existing platforms.
• In some cases, the nature of DOTM’s work and the occurrence of emergencies will limit
preparation time. Some possible strategies to address this include developing standardized
emergency response procedures and templates, providing regular training on emergency
response protocols and investing in tools for real-time communication and data sharing
during emergencies.
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 8 – DOTM-3 Interference Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with DOTM staff held on September 4, 2024.
Recommended Steps for Establishing the Future State:
• Form a working group to assess top ten documents to be digitized.
• Conduct a comprehensive needs assessment for the new system. Survey relevant divisions
to gather data on current document routing times, processes, and pain points.
• Determine internal capabilities and vendor support needed. Assess existing IT infrastructure
and support offered by digital public infrastructure. Determine the scope of external vendor
support.
• If external software is necessary, issue a RFP outlining specific requirements. Select a
vendor.
• Design and test new document routing workflows. Collaborate with key stakeholders to map
out the new document routing workflows for each document type.
• Develop or use a comprehensive training program on the new routing process.
• Deliver targeted training sessions to upskill employees.
• Implement the new tracking or automation system in phases. Start with a pilot phase
involving a limited number of participants to test the system in a real-world setting.
• Roll out the new system across all departments.
• Monitor and measure performance metrics. Provide ongoing support and optimization based
on feedback.
The map below is the future state version of the current document routing process map (shown
above in Figure 7). The red boxes represent the process steps that will either be highly streamline,
completely automated, or completely eliminated by implementing the recommendations detailed
above.
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 9 – DOTM-3 Future State Map
Source: Developed in work session with DOTM staff held on September 4, 2024.
Alignment of Department priorities with staffing and resources: The initiative to
modernize the document routing process is essential for DOTM to function effectively and efficiently.
While the initial investment in deploying the new system may be significant, the long-term benefits
outweigh the upfront costs. Some of the key benefits include:
• Despite the initial investment, the ongoing resource costs for running the modernized
process will be significantly lower than the status quo. This is because the new system will
automate many manual tasks, reducing the need for human intervention and associated
costs.
• The new system will streamline workflows, eliminate bottlenecks, and reduce processing
times. This will enable DOTM to make faster decisions and improve overall productivity.
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• By automating data entry and reducing manual handling, the new system will help to
minimize errors and ensure the accuracy of documents. This will reduce the risk of financial
losses and compliance issues.
• The new system will provide real-time tracking of document status, allowing DOTM to identify
and address bottlenecks proactively. This will improve accountability and enable better
decision-making.
• The new system can be designed with comprehensive security measures to protect sensitive
information and reduce the risk of data breaches.
• While the upfront effort required to deploy the new document routing system may be high,
the long-term benefits in terms of cost savings, efficiency, accuracy, visibility, and security
make it a worthwhile investment for DOTM. By modernizing its document routing process,
DOTM can improve its operations, enhance its reputation, and better serve its mission.
• Full integration and automation of the document routing system with the payroll process
requires the acquisition of a new accounts payable and receivable system that would more
fully integrate between the federal and state systems. This includes AASIS in the short-term,
and the new S4HANA (AASIS replacement) in a few years.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
As a result of initiative DOTM-03, the department will initially experience minimal process changes.
In the early stages, staff will continue to follow existing procedures while gradually adapting to new
responsibilities, such as providing input for system development. However, more significant
changes are expected to occur upon the deployment of the new system.
Once the system is fully implemented, processes will undergo substantial transformation, primarily
through the reduction of steps in workflows due to automation. Streamlined processes will arise
from the integration of various systems, allowing for seamless data flow and reducing redundancies.
This integration will simplify tasks and enhance overall efficiency, enabling staff to complete their
work more quickly and with fewer errors. The end result will be a more agile and responsive
department, equipped to meet evolving demands while maximizing productivity and effectiveness.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: To effectively
measure the success of the initiative, DOTM can ensure that the modernized document routing
process is delivering the expected benefits in terms of speed, accuracy, efficiency, and compliance:
• Average Document Routing Time: Track the average time it takes for a document to move
through the routing process from initiation to completion. Compare this to the current
average routing time to measure the increase in speed.
• Document Routing Error Rate: Calculate the percentage of documents that contain errors
after the routing process is completed. Compare this to the current error rate to measure the
increase in accuracy.
• Number of Documents Processed Monthly: Monitor the number of documents processed
each month to assess the overall volume and efficiency of the routing process.
• User Satisfaction: Conduct regular surveys or interviews with users to gather feedback on
the ease of use, functionality, and effectiveness of the new system.
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Cost Savings: Analyze the cost savings achieved by reducing manual labor, improving
efficiency, and minimizing errors.
• Compliance Adherence: Track the organization's compliance with relevant regulations and
standards related to document routing.
• System Uptime: Measure the percentage of time the new system is operational and
accessible to users.
• Training Effectiveness: Evaluate the effectiveness of the training program by measuring user
satisfaction, knowledge retention, and ability to use the new system effectively.
• Return on Investment (ROI): Calculate the ROI of the initiative by comparing the total cost of
implementation to the benefits achieved, such as increased efficiency, cost savings, and
improved compliance.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: The potential savings realized through initiative DOTM-03 could be
substantial. First, faster decision-making and improved inter-departmental collaboration will
reduce the time spent on approval processes and information sharing. By streamlining workflows
and automating routine tasks, decisions can be made more swiftly, which translates to less
downtime for projects and initiatives. This efficiency not only speeds up service delivery but also
minimizes delays that often incur additional costs.
Furthermore, the increase in operational productivity is likely to result in cost avoidance and/or cost
savings. As employees can dedicate more time to value-added activities rather than administrative
tasks, the overall output of the department will rise without the need for additional staffing. This
heightened productivity means that the organization can achieve more with the same resources,
effectively maximizing return on investment.
Lastly, the reduction in administrative overhead will contribute to financial savings by lowering
operational costs. With fewer manual processes, the need for extensive paperwork, printing, and
storage will decrease, resulting in direct cost reductions. Additionally, the elimination of
redundancies will allow for a more efficient allocation of resources, ultimately streamlining budgets
and enhancing the organization's financial health. Collectively, these savings will not only improve
the bottom line but also enable reinvestment into strategic initiatives that further enhance DOTM
capabilities.
Change Management Plan: Initiative DOTM-03 aims to modernize the document routing
process, which could lead to significant changes in the way employees work. Some potential change
management challenges DOTM could face may include:
• Resistance to Change: Employees may be resistant to the new system due to fear of the
unknown, job insecurity, or the disruption of their current routines.
• Lack of Understanding: Employees may not fully understand the benefits of the new system
or how it will impact their daily tasks.
• Technical Difficulties: Employees may encounter technical difficulties with the new system,
leading to frustration and decreased productivity.
• Data Accuracy and Integrity: Ensuring the accuracy and integrity of data during the transition
to the new system can be challenging.
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Ineffective Training: Insufficient or poorly designed training programs can hinder employee
adoption and effectiveness.
• Integration Issues: Integrating the new system with existing systems or processes can be
complex and time-consuming.
Some strategies DOTM can use to address these challenges include:
• Effective Communication: Clearly communicate the benefits of the new system, address
concerns, and provide regular updates throughout the implementation process.
• Employee Involvement: Involve employees in the planning and implementation stages to
increase buy-in and address concerns.
• Comprehensive Training: Provide comprehensive training programs that cover both
technical aspects and the benefits of the new system.
• Pilot Testing: Conduct a pilot test to identify and address potential issues before full-scale
implementation.
• Data Migration Plan: Develop a thorough data migration plan to ensure the accuracy and
integrity of data during the transition.
• Change Management Team: Establish a dedicated change management team to oversee the
process and address challenges.
• Incentives and Rewards: Recognize and reward employees for their contributions to the
successful implementation of the new system.
• Technical Support: Provide adequate technical support to assist employees with any issues
they may encounter.
The communication tasks and recommended modalities are included in Figure 10.
Figure 10 – ADOM-03 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Responsible Party
Legislative ● With the upfront investment ● Face-to-face Jeff Wood, COS
stakeholders to pursue this technology meetings
solution, DOTM will be able to ● Development of
significantly modernize one pagers and
operations. briefing materials
● The new system will
streamline workflows,
eliminate bottlenecks, and
reduce processing times. This
will enable DOTM to make
faster decisions and improve
overall productivity.
● By automating data entry and
reducing manual handling,
the new system will help to
minimize errors.
DOTM Staff (state ● DOTM will be implementing a ● All staff meetings Jeff Wood, COS
and federal) new automated tool to ● All staff emails
support document routing. ● Team meetings
with impacted staff
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Audience Key Messages Modalities Responsible Party
● This will reduce the time it
takes to receive approval and
improve decision-making.
● [INSERT] timeline and details
of implementation.
● Detailed training and
instructions will be provided
to staff as part of
implementation.
DOTM-04 - Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and
efficiency
This initiative is part of the broader Arkansas Forward Agile Organization initiative and includes
implementing a tailored and modernized organization to ensure effective distribution of
management responsibilities, enhanced operational efficiency, and improved role clarity among
managerial positions.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DOTM has a unique organizational structure, which
includes federal and state employees, and the organization’s size fluctuates over time based on use
of the National Guard. There are limited opportunities for further organization restructuring for
several reasons:
• Supervisor positions are federal employees (with federal funding);
• Team size is influenced by federal supervisors and changes are not solely within DOTM’s
span of control;
• DOTM has already centralized its shared services functions under the Chief of Staff. Two
positions and an administrative position remain outside the Chief of Staff’s reporting
structure, but policy reasons provide a need to maintain the current structure.
Rationale: As part of Initiative DOTM-4, to create the most agile and efficient organization, DOTM
leadership and human resources staff reviewed the organization structure and determined no
changes within DOTM’s span of control are needed at this time. However, multiple initiatives
identified as part of Arkansas Forward seek to improve how the organization functions, given this
organization structure, and improvements to the organization’s effectiveness and efficiency are
expected from these efforts.
Implementation Considerations: Not applicable.
DOTM-05: Maximize federal funding opportunities through re-configured
state funding
This initiative identifies funding opportunities to increase program and service capacity and free up
existing general revenue funding by reassessing and deprioritizing non-critical building projects to
reduce capital spending by using alternative solutions such as repurposing or renovating existing
buildings instead of constructing new ones.
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Initiative Overview and Current State: DOTM manages the state's resources and oversees
the readiness and administration of the Arkansas National Guard. They operate and maintain several
training sites and armories. The National Guard has four major training sites, including:
• Camp Robinson;
• Fort Chaffee;
• Ebbing Air National Guard Base; and,
• Little Rock Air Force Base.
Several armories are located throughout the state. These settings support training, domestic
response, equipment staging, communications, supply distributions, and serve as a base for
operations. Several of these armories and training sites need repair or new construction to provide
the infrastructure to ensure the National Guard’s readiness.
The funds to support DOTM’s operations, maintenance, personnel, management, equipment, and
construction are financed through state appropriations and federal funding from the Department of
Defense (DOD). The state’s annual appropriation is approximately $10 million, whereas the federal
allocation is $450 million. State funds are used as matching funds to draw federal funding. DOD
matches new construction at 75% (25% state share), and renovations at 50% (50% state share). DOD
new construction projects are competitive and historically, usually fund a state’s project once every
4-5 years.
DOTM is in need of additional state and federal funds for new construction projects, as well as to
repair, refurbish, and renovate some of its buildings. DOTM has already secured funding for some
new construction and recognizes the timing of any new large requests may not be feasible. Instead,
DOTM seeks funding for multiple small projects to repurpose or renovate existing buildings, which
may be more cost-effective than new construction projects.
Another challenge that impacts DOTM’s large projects is the lack of fiscal predictability, particularly
for those large projects that cross different state fiscal years. Large construction projects take
multiple years to complete and can extend across different federal and state fiscal years.
Assurances that funding will be available over multiple years is essential to move forward on large
new construction projects.
Rationale: DOTM has multiple facility needs including new construction and repairs and
renovation of existing facilities, including:
• New gym at Camp Robinson (estimated cost of $7 million);
• New machine gun range (estimated cost of $7 million);
• New medical center (estimated cost of $40 million); and,
• Multiple buildings are in need of repair and renovation (i.e., some armories do not have
women’s rest rooms or shower facilities; several armories are aging, having been built in the
1930s and/or are listed on the National Register of Historic Places - Clarksville Armory in
Johnson County); and some facilities have ceased to be sufficient for National Guard use
and have been turned over to local government for use).
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
This initiative seeks to:
• Increase overall funding opportunities by identifying and applying for federal opportunities
and improving coordination between state and federal budgets and fiscal years;
• Reassess and prioritize existing projects based on comprehensive analysis of needs, with a goal
to reduce capital spend and repurpose existing facilities over new construction where possible.
Improving available funding will support DOTM operations and prepare units for readiness, and
provides economic value by maintaining the National Guard’s footprint across the state. The
National Guard employs local citizens and service members support the local economy. As an
example, in 2019, the National Guard relocated to the armory in Harrison after some time in
Bentonville. Col. Cary Shillcutt, the 39th Brigade Commander, reported that the effort contributed
over $900,000 to the Boone County area based on the location of 70 National Guard members in the
community, as well as from impacted individuals in the surrounding area.1
Implementation Considerations:
The approach to ensuring a successful implementation of this initiative is to identify the need,
prioritize the solution, and communicate the business case for securing the funding. Appendix A –
DOTM Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for implementation of
this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process were identified through interviews and
work sessions with DOTM staff.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
The success of the initiative will be dependent on identifying risks, mitigating these risks, and ensuing
strategies that enable success. The following risks, mitigation, and strategies identified to date are:
• Conducting an assessment and review of the National Guard facility conditions to identify
what needs repair and/or renovation. Evaluate this assessment to determine the project cost
and use this information to justify the spending.
• Developing and implementing a communication plan that shows the value of having the best
possible facilities that support the National Guard service member readiness to serve today
and in the future.
• Staying persistent in the task, adhering to the need, and demonstrating the value to the
Guard, local community, and the State will increase the likelihood of successfully securing
the funds.
• Coordinating a task force to develop standard operating procedures to monitor and
synchronize the timelines of state and federal budget cycles since they pose a risk because
they are misaligned timelines between state and federal budgetary deadlines and spanning
fiscal years.
1
KY3, “National Guard unit moves into armory in Harrison, Ark.,” October 19, 2019,
https://www.ky3.com/content/news/National-Guard-unit-moves-in-to-armory-in-Harrison-Ark-
563462271.html.
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• Developing a standardized mechanism to prioritize obtaining general revenue to ensure that
critical matching opportunities are met, since there is a risk that insufficient state revenue to
obtain federal matching opportunities can result in the state sacrificing federal funds.
Recommended steps for implementing DOTM-05:
• Steps to increase overall funding:
o Assign Project Officer.
o Establish a stakeholder coordination task force.
o Develop Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) for identifying, analyzing, and
applying for federal funding opportunities and ensuring timing coordination between
state and federal fiscal budgets.
o Conduct a comprehensive review of current state funding initiatives to identify
opportunities for federal funding.
o Compile and document a list of all potential federal funding opportunities that align
with state initiatives and submit applications.
o Review and update SOPs based on feedback and evolving requirements.
• Steps to reassess and prioritize building projects:
o Conduct a comprehensive review of facility conditions, unit size, and unit types.
o Evaluate findings of facility review and develop recommendations for build versus
renovate.
o Act in order of priority for building projects based on recommendations of the working
group.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Developing a
comprehensive understanding of DOTM facility needs, prioritizing needs, and pursuing with the most
effective plan (renovation vs. new construction) is essential for effective National Guard programs
and creation of an environment that supports preparation for readiness. DOTM needs to assign a
Project Manager, budgetary, and legal support to oversee and guide the initiative. Additionally,
stakeholder coordination is important in assessing and prioritizing needs. Upon completion of
analysis of needs and prioritization, DOTM will present needs and the most cost-effective strategy
to proceed in addressing needs. This could result in a shift to renovation and free-up general revenue
funds, or prioritize new construction and include a request for more general revenue funds to
increase federal financial participation.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: Changes in identifying, analyzing, and applying for federal funds and coordinating state and
federal budget cycles and requirements will necessitate the development of Standard Operating
Procedures. A review of federal and state funding opportunities may involve different approaches to
achieving funding. Alternately, if an analysis of the National Guard facilities conditions determines
new construction better serves DOTM, the initiative may evolve.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
results of the initiative are to enhance federal matching funds and increase the program and service
capacity, as well as to optimize DOTM facilities to meet the National Guard and DOTM needs.
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Recommended performance measures are:
• Ratio of federal/state funds; and,
• Rate of acting on readiness center transformation plan findings within 2 years.
Other methods to assess the impact of this initiative include:
• Enhance the quality and reach of cooperative agreements by meeting maximum federal fund
matching policies;
• Increase program and service capacity; and,
• Ensure optimized facilities meet the National Guard and DOTM needs.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: Based on initial estimates, DOTM has the potential positive annual
reoccurring fiscal impact of $1.1 million based on anticipated prioritization of facility needs and
reduction in capital spending (shift from new construction to renovations).
Change Management Plan: Collaboration with state leadership, the federal government, and
local leadership is critical to this initiative. Decision makers at the state level need to be convinced
that this initiative will result in a better readiness prepared National Guard, support the local and
state economy, and generate ongoing maintenance savings. This is accomplished through a
comprehensive and informative communication plan. Figure 10 includes activities and modalities
for the communication plan.
Figure 10 – DOTM-05 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities
National Guard Service ● What repairs are being considered ● Memos
Members and why ● Emails
● Any operational changes that will ● Staff meetings
occur during construction periods
● Timeframes
Department of Defense ● What repairs need to be done and ● Memos
why ● Emails
● Estimated cost ● Required Documentation
● Requests for federal matching
funds (in prescribed format)
State Leaders ● Summary of DOTM facility needs ● Memos
● The value the National Guard ● Face-to-face meetings
brings to local communities ● Emails
● How these projects will improve
the readiness of the National
Guard
● What repairs need to be done and
why
● Estimated cost
● Additional federal funding available
and projected freed-up GR or
savings that can come from needs
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DOTM Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Strategic Management Plan:
Arkansas Department of Public Safety
Table of Contents
Overview .............................................................................................................................. 1
Recommended Organizational Structure ........................................................................... 2
How this Department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective future department .............. 4
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation ...................................... 5
DPS-01: Implement an agency-wide shared services electronic, mobile-friendly tracking system
to increase efficiency and effectiveness of processes .......................................................................... 5
DPS-02: Develop shared services standardized processes, to include automated workflows, to
increase efficiency and effectiveness .................................................................................................. 11
DPS-03: Collaborate with other state agencies to pool purchasing, maintenance, and instrument
calibration ............................................................................................................................................... 25
DPS-04: Contract for development of an integrated Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD) system that
interfaces with all current DPS law enforcement systems ................................................................. 30
DPS-05: Strengthen and Expand the Leadership Academy ................................................................ 33
DPS-06: Focus on talent targeting and career development. ............................................................. 39
DPS-07: Understand current obstacles to decommissioning state police vehicles......................... 44
DPS-08: Enhance operational efficiency of the abuse and neglect hotline ...................................... 49
Overview
The Arkansas Department of Public Safety (DPS) is the umbrella law enforcement agency that
includes 17 previously independent entities which were transferred to DPS in 2019 (Act 910),
including but not limited to:
• Department of Arkansas State Police;
• Crimes Against Children Division;
• Law Enforcement Support Office;
• State Crime Laboratory; and,
• Multiple Commissions and Boards.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
DPS’ mission is to enhance the safety and security of all Arkansans through ethical, character driven
behavior that promotes professionalism, clear communication, and accountability while the state’s
premier public safety agency.
Through the Arkansas Forward project, a 2024 initiative to improve the efficiency and effectiveness
of Arkansas’ 15 cabinet-level departments, DPS prioritized implementation of eight initiatives that
improve operations and invest in the organization’s talent to help DPS deliver on its mission.
This Strategic Management Plan (“Plan”) memorializes the work completed by DPS during Arkansas
Forward, translating the department’s vision into a plan consisting of recommended organizational
structure, key initiatives prioritized for immediate implementation, and related performance
metrics. A companion project plan (“Work Plan”) provides a more detailed resource to support
implementation of the initiatives by DPS’ Arkansas Forward project management team.
Recommended Organizational Structure
DPS’ current organization chart is shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1 – Current Organizational Structure
As part of Arkansas Forward, DPS undertook a review of the staffing model used in its shared services
and civilian units. This review included identification of opportunities to create a more agile
organization, considering spans of control and number of managerial layers, among other factors.
DPS’ structure was reviewed to identify opportunities for redesign in three areas:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission;
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives; and,
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ move to deliver certain functions through shared services
(i.e., information technology, human resources, procurement).
There was no work carried out on the organization chart for the Department’s front-line mission.
Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives: DPS identified
opportunities for potential organizational improvements in several key areas involving shared services
and civilian staff (shown on the organizational chart in Figure 2 as blue boxes), including:
• Under the Chief of Staff, General Counsel: There are opportunities to revisit the management
chain and potentially flatten organizational layers that could be impacting the speed of
decision-making and flow of communication.
• Within the Chief Financial Officer’s organization: There are multiple small teams with 1-3
direct reports. These small teams may be able to be consolidated with other teams and
opportunities to eliminate extraneous organizational layers may exist, though it will be
important during this process to identify any specific statutory or other requirements to
maintain checks and balances which could prevent this consolidation (particularly in
finance).
• Civilian units with opportunities to review spans of control (note these units are led by
officers):
o Within one Lieutenant Colonel’s organization, there are two civilian units flagged for
review based on the large span of control. Under one Major with a span of control of
18 (note this was previously two units which were consolidated following a
departure), there may be an opportunity to add another leader or a deputy to reduce
the span of control. Under another Major, with a span of control of 3, there is a team
led by an ASP/CACD Investigator Administrator with 14 direct staff, where employees
are located over a large geographical area. It may be beneficial to reduce the number
of direct reports to improve the quality of supervision.
o Within another Lieutenant Colonel’s organization, there is a Major-led unit with
multiple civilian teams where small team size and additional management layers
could be flattened to simplify the organization structure.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 2 – Current Organizational Structure
Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ move to deliver certain functions through shared services:
At this time, the recommendation for DPS’ future state organization is to continue the current
organization structure, as included in Figure 1, while implementing the following:
• Continue to have discussions with senior leadership about the principles of an agile
organization to reinforce the expectation that leaders make changes in their organizations as
appropriate;
• Encourage each leader corresponding to a blue box on Figure 2 to perform an in-depth review
of their organization to identify appropriate changes; and,
• Direct each leader to review the necessity of positions upon becoming vacant (i.e., with
retirement or transitions) and use those opportunities to make the organization more efficient
with less abrasion.
How this Department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective
future department
DPS has taken a comprehensive approach in the identification of its Arkansas Forward initiatives: to
identify opportunities to improve standardization and automation of processes, improve use of
technology within its state police, contain high costs for laboratory equipment through inter-
departmental collaboration, improve the efficiency of its fleet, and invest in staff
recruitment/retention and development. DPS has identified the means to achieve this improvement
while operating within its existing resources for most of these initiatives. To achieve the efficiencies
expected with these initiatives, DPS will need to collaborate with other cabinet-level departments,
including the Department of Transformation and Shared Services (TSS) and the Department of
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Finance and Administration (DFA). Gaining their support and collaboration will be an important
enabling factor in DPS’ success.
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward
Implementation
DPS leadership generated 9 ideas to improve the departmental effectiveness and efficiency, before
prioritizing 8 initiatives for immediate implementation as part of Arkansas Forward that focus on
improving operational performance.
DPS-01: Implement an agency-wide shared services electronic, mobile-
friendly tracking system to increase efficiency and effectiveness of
processes
This initiative seeks to implement a workflow management tool to support routing of work and
decision-making at DPS, providing staff with the ability to monitor the status of pending requests.
The intent of this initiative is to support administrative processes such as the contracts, grants, and
budget processes, where collaboration across teams is required, and to automate steps such as
approvals (enabled by electronic signature).
Initiative Overview and Current State: Once formed in 2019, DPS implemented a shared
services model to deliver certain administrative services efficiently and eliminate redundancy and
duplication across divisions. Certain processes such as contracts, grants, and budget processes
involve staff from across teams. While centralization has achieved some efficiencies, a challenge
experienced by staff is the lack of ability to manage and track the status of work as it moves between
multiple teams and for leadership review and approval. This results in confusion, difficulty identifying
when work is stalled or delayed, and inability to intervene or prioritize high-priority tasks. This lack of
visibility leads to frequent bottlenecks and delays, especially when manual processes are involved.
Some staff operational processes are manual and rely on paper documentation, while others have
some degrees of digitization, but key processes have not been automated in a single workflow.
As a result, there are bottlenecks in existing processes when signatures or approvals are required, as
these tasks are typically handled in a manual manner (whether physical or digital files are involved),
creating multiple potential points of failure where decisions can be delayed. These manual
interventions often require individuals to take specific actions, causing additional delays as
documents and approvals wait in queues. The lack of an integrated, automated system for managing
shared services functions means that important tasks can remain unnoticed for extended periods,
reducing overall efficiency and making it challenging to ensure that high-priority work is completed
on time. This creates an environment where DPS struggles to respond quickly to critical needs and
to maintain a consistent, streamlined flow of work.
Rationale: This initiative would have DPS implement a technology solution to support routing of
work and decision-making across DPS’ divisions. DPS anticipates this solution will be the S4HANA
system, the replacement for the AASIS system. This new system will provide the necessary
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
infrastructure for a more efficient Shared Services model, both statewide and within DPS. The
Department of Finance and Administration (DFA) has a current workgroup process to ensure that all
15 cabinet-level agencies have the opportunity to provide input on the development of the S4HANA
system. Formalization of this collaborative approach will help identify and prioritize the collective
needs of the departments. By fostering open communication and collaboration, DFA can create a
more effective and user-friendly system that supports efficient financial transactions, personnel
actions, and procurement across all agencies. This collective input will ultimately lead to a solution
that is adaptable and beneficial for the entire state. If provided this opportunity to participate, DPS
will actively participate to ensure that its needs are integrated into the system's design, including key
use cases and system requirements.
S4HANA will offer automated workflows and digital processes that can track work as it progresses
through the system. This real-time tracking is a critical feature, as it will eliminate many of the
bottlenecks and inefficiencies currently experienced. By automating processes and incorporating
digital signatures, DPS will reduce manual intervention, ensuring that tasks are handled more quickly
and with greater accuracy.
Additional benefits of an automated workflow with automatic tracking and digital signatures include:
• Increased transparency: Staff will have visibility into the status of tasks, allowing for better
management of priorities and more effective monitoring of stalled or delayed work.
• Improved efficiency: Automation will significantly reduce the manual labor associated with
tracking, approvals, and signatures, speeding up the overall process.
• Enhanced accountability: Automatic tracking allows for clear accountability, as the system
records who performed specific actions and when, reducing the likelihood of errors or lost
documents
• Streamlined approval process: Digital signatures enable faster approvals without the need
for physical handoffs or waiting on individuals, improving the flow of work.
• Reduction in paper usage: Fully digital workflows will reduce reliance on paper, cutting costs
and promoting sustainability.
• Compliance and audit readiness: Automatic tracking and digital records make it easier to
meet regulatory requirements and conduct audits, as all actions are logged within the
system.
• Mobile friendly: Easier for staff to access applications and increases timely response.
Staff anticipates that the new system may meet most of its needs. Once the system design is
finalized, DPS leadership will meet to review whether its needs are addressed, to identify any needs
that will not be able to be addressed through the new system, and to identify whether any needs are
critical and cannot wait for the statewide implementation of S4HANA. They can then collectively
decide whether another solution is needed to address those issues.
There are some steps DPS can take now to not only address needs of the department but also
prepare a foundation for successful implementation of the S4HANA system:
• Streamline Processes: Reduce the number of approval levels for low profile processes, such as
high-volume, low-cost purchases and set standardized thresholds for different categories of
purchases. This will minimize bottlenecks and expedite the procurement of essential supplies.
This can be repeated in other areas as well.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Identify processes for automation: Analyze existing processes to identify processes that are
repetitive, time-consuming, or prone to errors, which will be prime candidates for
automation within the new system.
• Choose the right short term automation tools: Research and select automation tools that
are compatible with the future S4HANA system and suitable for DPS’ specific needs.
Certain tools could be used to automate or semi-automate key constraints.
• Begin staff training and process improvement: As the S4HANA system is being developed,
DPS can start training staff on new technologies and processes, as well as considering
process improvements (using new technology to improve processes not only automate
existing, inefficient processes). This will reduce the learning curve and resistance to change
when the system is deployed.
Implementation Considerations:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
In a facilitated work session with DPS staff, staff identified some of the challenges in implementing
a workflow management solution, as well as solutions to address these challenges (summarized in
Figure 3 below). The goal of implementing an improved workflow management solution in shown in
the blue box, with each barrier or challenge in a red box and each related solution in a green box. In
summary, some of the key challenges anticipated include:
• Compatibility and integration issues: Integrating the new S4HANA system with existing
systems may pose challenges. Ensuring that data and processes flow seamlessly between
legacy systems and the new platform is critical to avoid disruptions. Some potential
solutions include thorough capability testing, data migration planning, and API integration.
• Employee acceptance/resistance to change: Employees may resist the transition to the new
system due to discomfort with change or unfamiliarity with new technology. Ensuring proper
training and communication is vital to secure user buy-in and smooth adoption.
• DFA not incorporating user suggestions into the final product: DFA is focused on
implementing a statewide solution; there is a risk that input from DPS and other state
departments may not be fully considered during the development of the S4HANA system,
leading to a final product that does not meet all user needs. Effective communication and
collaboration with DFA will be essential to mitigate this issue.
• Security considerations/risks with the automated solution: Consider adding multi-factor
authentication and/or encryption to the system requirements.
In the diagram below, the goal of implementing a workflow management solution is shown in blue,
and each of the red boxes represents a barrier or anticipated challenge. The green boxes represent
solutions to those barriers.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 3 - DPS-01 Interference Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with DPS staff held on September 10, 2024.
Steps for Establishing the Future State:
• Leadership reviews/approves emerging IT requirements:
o Ensure IT requirements align with strategic goals.
o Verify recommendations are comprehensive and feasible.
• Leadership meets with DFA to communicate requirements:
o Clearly outline IT needs and expectations to DFA.
• Ensure workgroups have been developed with DFA and other departments for feedback and
testing:
o Create cross-functional teams for diverse input.
o Schedule regular meetings for feedback during development phases.
o Assess where business process reengineering is appropriate to ensure S4HANA
facilitates process improvement and not only digitizing legacy processes.
o Regular updates from, input to, and coordination with DFA during development
• Set up consistent communication channels for progress reports.
• Address any issues or roadblocks as they arise through collaboration.
• Ensure feedback is being put into action in terms of system development, via regular testing
and demonstrations.
o Organize periodic system testing to verify improvements.
o Conduct demonstrations to showcase functionality and gather further input.
• Develop and deploy training to staff (most staff impacted)
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o Create comprehensive training materials tailored to different user groups.
o Implement training sessions to ensure smooth transition to new systems.
• Establish connectivity between DPS and DFA system (SAP-S4 upgrade S4HANA)
o Ensure technical compatibility between systems.
o Test connectivity thoroughly before deployment.
• Ensure different providers in place for C.O.O.P. (Continuity of Operations Plan)
o Identify and contract multiple service providers for redundancy.
o Test failover systems to guarantee operational continuity.
• Establish internal workgroup at DPS to review existing workflows and implement
improvements based on S4HANA automation. Develop revised “future state” process maps
for the key operational areas included in this report and other areas as needed. Develop
standard operating procedures for staff.
As DFA moves forward with the implementation of the S4HANA system, critical needs of DPS include
that the solution includes workflow tools and electronic signatures. If DFA’s initial plan changes and
these functionalities are omitted, it would result in S4HANA not meeting DPS needs, and would result
in a lack of support from stakeholders who anticipated these enhancements. In parallel to the action
steps above, DPS plans to proactively explore alternative systems that can meet their essential
needs if S4HANA plans change. It is important for DPS to conduct a market analysis to identify viable
options for workflow tools and electronic signatures as a potential back-up should S4HANA not meet
their needs.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: DPS has the
necessary staffing resources to accomplish this initiative without requiring additional personnel. In
the short term, only a few staff members will need to take on new responsibilities, such as
gathering business requirements and participating in the system’s development. The key resource
needed for success is the formalization of an all-agency S4HANA workgroup. DFA has informally
sought departmental feedback on the project, but it is expected that since S4HANA will replace the
backbone of Arkansas Shared Services, it is critical that all state departments, including DPS, have
input into the development process. This collaborative effort will ensure that the system is tailored
to meet the collective needs of all departments, maximizing the effectiveness and usability of the
new platform.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
As noted above, there are opportunities for short-term process improvement, as well as longer-term
improvements enabled by S4HANA’s implementation, both of which could result in process changes.
Once S4HANA is fully developed, existing processes will need to adapt to align with the capabilities
of the new system. Early involvement in the system's development will help ensure that the new
workflows are shaped around the needs of the processes rather than forcing processes to conform
to the system. As development progresses, DPS will also begin planning for the necessary process
changes to ensure a smooth transition when the system is deployed, avoiding delays between
system implementation and process adaptation.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: To measure the
success of the shared services tracking system initiative (DPS-01), it is essential to establish clear
and actionable metrics, including:
• Timeliness of decision-making and task completion (expected to reduce).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: DPS-01 initiative is anticipated to have a significant positive impact on the
department by streamlining processes and improving operational efficiency. By reducing the time
spent on manual processes, staff will be able to focus on higher-value tasks, freeing up resources
and improving productivity. The implementation of automated workflows through the S4HANA
system will eliminate the need for paper-based or manual approvals, resulting in faster processing
times and reduced risk of delays or lost documentation.
Increased efficiency in day-to-day operations will lead to better tracking of work progress, allowing
management to easily monitor the status of contracts, grants, budgets, and other administrative
tasks. This visibility will enhance decision-making by providing real-time data on workflow
bottlenecks or stalled items, enabling quicker resolutions. Overall, the improved tracking and
streamlined processes will result in a more responsive and effective department, better equipped to
prioritize and fast-track high-priority work while maintaining accountability across all functions.
Expected time savings for employees as a result of this initiative include:
Staff directly involved in shared services (e.g., contract managers, grant administrators,
budget analysts):
• Time savings could range from 20% to 40% due to streamlined processes, automated
workflows, and reduced manual data entry.
• Elimination of manual signature/approval processes could save a significant amount of time
per transaction, potentially reducing processing time by 10-20%.
Managers and supervisors:
• Time savings could range from 10% to 20% due to improved visibility into work progress,
automated reporting, and reduced need for manual intervention.
• Real-time tracking and automated notifications could save managers significant time in
identifying and resolving bottlenecks, potentially reducing their workload by 5-10%.
Employees in other departments who interact with shared services:
• Time savings could range from 5% to 15% due to faster response times, improved
communication, and reduced need for follow-up.
• Streamlined processes and automated notifications could reduce the time employees
spend on administrative tasks related to shared services, potentially freeing up 2-5% of their
overall workload.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
These estimations are based on qualitative analysis and may vary depending on the specific context
and implementation of the recommendations. To obtain more accurate estimates, it would be
beneficial to conduct a detailed time-tracking study before and after implementing the changes.
Change Management Plan: When the S4HANA system is implemented, it is anticipated DFA
will oversee training and development of staff resources. To the extent DPS is able to modernize some
of its key business processes using this tool, DPS will need to manage the change in those processes
internally and communicate with impacted staff about the timeline and extent of changes. It is
anticipated a communication plan will need to be implemented at that time. Because this
implementation is not anticipated until 2026, short-term process improvements will be considered
as part of this initiative as well, which may necessitate some staff training and communication tasks.
DPS-02: Develop shared services standardized processes, to include
automated workflows, to increase efficiency and effectiveness
This initiative directs DPS to develop automated workflows for consistency and timeliness of
processes and deliverables. DPS will identify any processes where variance is necessary for effective
performance.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DPS’ current operations are characterized by a lack
of standardization, reliance on manual processes and a lack of digitization, and inconsistencies
across different divisions. This leads to inefficiencies, errors, delays, and increased costs. For
example, manual data entry can introduce errors, affecting the accuracy and reliability of data.
Additionally, the manual nature of the processes makes it difficult to track progress, monitor
performance, and ensure compliance with regulations. This lack of visibility can hinder decision-
making and prevent the identification of opportunities for improvement.
To illustrate challenges within existing operational processes, staff participated in facilitated
mapping sessions to identify steps in several common administrative processes. Figures 4 – 8
illustrate the current processes for: Procurement; Travel approval/reimbursement; Overtime
tracking; HR Onboarding; and HR Terminations.
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Figure 4 – Procurement Current State Map
Source: Developed in work session with DPS staff held on September 10, 2024.
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Figure 5 – Travel Approval/Reimbursement Current State Map
Source: Developed in work session with DPS staff held on September 10, 2024.
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Figure 6 – Overtime Tracking Current State Map
Source: Developed in work session with DPS staff held on September 10, 2024.
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Figure 7 – HR Onboarding Current State Map
Source: Developed in work session with DPS staff held on September 10, 2024.
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Figure 8 – HR Terminations Current State Map
Source: Developed in work session with DPS staff held on September 10, 2024.
Rationale: The lack of standardized processes and workflows at DPS creates inefficiencies,
inconsistencies, and potential errors. Manual tasks, which are prevalent in the existing processes,
can be time-consuming, prone to human error, and hinder productivity. The lack of standardization
across different divisions further complicates the implementation of a unified, automated solution.
These manual processes often lead to delays, bottlenecks, and increased costs due to redundant
tasks and manual data entry. Moreover, inconsistent processes can increase the risk of non-
compliance with regulations and policies, potentially resulting in fines or penalties. Manual data
entry can introduce errors and inconsistencies, affecting the accuracy and reliability of data. Finally,
the manual nature of the processes can make it difficult to track the status of requests, monitor
performance, and identify areas for improvement.
Implementation Considerations: Many state agencies have been confronted with the
challenge of modernizing their operations and digitizing manual and paper-based processes. In
recent years, the Minnesota Lottery and South Dakota Department of Education are two examples of
departments that have transitioned from manual, paper, or digital document processes to
automated workflows. Some of the best practices emerging from these examples include:
• Clear communication and Stakeholder Engagement: Clearly articulate the advantages of the
automated system, such as increased efficiency, reduced errors, and improved compliance.
Actively address any concerns or resistance from stakeholders, providing reassurance and
addressing potential drawbacks. Engage stakeholders in the design and implementation process
to foster support and ownership.
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• Gradual Implementation: Introduce the automated system gradually, starting with less
critical processes to allow stakeholders to adjust to the changes. Maintain both manual and
automated systems initially to provide a safety net and facilitate a smoother transition.
• Comprehensive Training: Provide comprehensive training that is tailored to the specific needs of
different user groups. Offer ongoing support and assistance to help users adapt to the new
system and address any issues that may arise.
• Data Migration and Quality Assurance: ensure that data is accurately transferred from the old
system to the new one, minimizing errors and inconsistencies. Implement data quality checks to
maintain the integrity of information throughout the transition.
• Continuous Improvement: Regularly monitor the performance of the automated system to
identify areas for improvement. Collect feedback from users to understand their experiences
and identify opportunities for enhancement. Continuously update and refine the system
based on user feedback and evolving needs.
• Security and Compliance: Implement strong security measures to protect sensitive data and
ensure compliance with relevant regulations. Conduct regular audits to assess the system's
security and compliance posture.
• Leverage Success Stories: Highlight the successes and benefits achieved by other
organizations that have successfully implemented similar automated systems. Use positive
examples to build momentum and encourage adoption among stakeholders.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
In summary, DPS anticipates key risks that include:
• Lack of funding for new IT systems and ongoing maintenance/systems. Obtain Executive
support of new system by illustrating the increased efficiency and benefits of the new system,
including potential cost-savings through administrative reductions.
• Developing standard processes for all DPS divisions is challenging, given uniqueness of
certain divisions. For example, Crime Lab currently works differently than other divisions.
Unlike other divisions, Crime Lab already has a purchasing/procurement system that
integrates a more automated workflow and tracking as a result of Crime Lab being its own
department prior to 2019 Transformation.
o Strategy: Option - DPS adopts Crime Lab’s system - QualTrax
o Strategy: Option - Transition Crime Lab to new DPS system
o Strategy: Option - Allow Crime Lab to operate differently, should interface with new
DPS system
In a facilitated work session with DPS staff, staff identified some of the challenges in implementing
standard and automated operational processes, as well as solutions to address these challenges
(summarized in Figure 9 below). The goal of implementing an improved workflow management
solution in shown in the blue box, with each barrier or challenge in a red box and each related
solution in a green box.
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Figure 9 – DPS-02 Interference Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with DPS staff held on September 10, 2024.
Steps to Implement Standardized Processes (future state):
Figures 10 – 14 illustrate how process improvement could be achieved through standardization and
automation.
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Figure 10 – Procurement Future State Map
Source: Developed in work session with DPS staff held on September 10, 2024.
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Figure 11 – Travel Approval/Reimbursement Future State Map
Source: Developed in work session with DPS staff held on September 10, 2024.
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Figure 12 – Overtime Tracking Future State Map
Source: Developed in work session with DPS staff held on September 10, 2024.
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Figure 13 – HR Onboarding Future State Map
Source: Developed in work session with DPS staff held on September 10, 2024.
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Figure 14 – HR Termination Future State Map
Source: Developed in work session with DPS staff held on September 10, 2024.
To accomplish the standardization through automation of processes, planned action steps
include:
● Meet with Crime Lab to understand their tracking system (complete). The Crime Lab was
identified as a unit with a digital and modern workflow, which could provide a model for use
across other units.
● Identify the team to review to-be system options and approval of preliminary design (in-
progress).
● Leadership reviews/approves design from the team.
● Validate the collected business requirements for the new system, engaging TSS Division of
Information Services (DIS) and Office of State Procurement (OSP) as needed.
● Select new system.
● Leadership makes decision on contract vehicle.
● Release RFP for the new system using requirements (possibly with demonstrations)
● Award vendor.
● Implement and train staff on new system (will require detailed project plan).
● Implement communication plan.
Alignment of Department priorities with staffing and resources: DPS has sufficient
staffing and resources to implement this new system once procured. The change will require
additional time by IT staff to deploy the system in coordination with the vendor and additional time
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by Shared Services staff to learn how the new system works, as well as training additional staff from
the remaining divisions on how to use it. However, despite the initial time investment, it is expected
that the time savings from implementing automated processes will outweigh the initial time spent.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
The adoption of the new solution will enable the existing process to be automated. DPS will use the
opportunity not only to automate the existing process (which has value) but also to improve the
existing process through automation. Many of the bottlenecks in the existing processes relate to
communication or manual workarounds to make the existing process work and they result from the
delays caused by not having an electronic, automated workflow with transparent status tracking.
Over time, DPS will identify additional process changes as staff learn about the potential of the new
system and are able to develop process improvements.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
• Order/Approval Cycle Time (average time it takes for an order or request to be processed and
approved (expected to decrease);
• Percent of workflows tracked automatically (expected to increase);
• Error rate related to individual processes (expected to decrease); and,
• Employee satisfaction (expected to increase).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: The improvements are expected to yield benefits for DPS staff through
reduced manual work and in improved process efficiency. As shown in Figures 6-10, there are entire
process steps that can be automated completely or partially (shown in green). As a result, the
improvements can be quantified to show the reduction in overall effort required by staff to achieve
the same or better results as are achieved today. Most of the processes affected by this initiative will
see improvements anywhere from 45% to 75% reduction in effort, with two that will continue to
require some manual steps still experiencing between 12.5% - 20% reduction. Figure 15
demonstrates a methodology to quantify the improved level of effort by counting the
impacted/removed process steps and dividing by the total number of steps.
Figure 15 – DPS-02 Step Reduction Analysis
Process Total Steps Impacted/Removed Percent Reduction
Steps
Procurement 27 18 66.7%
Travel 20 13 65%
Overtime Tracking 17 8 47.1%
Onboarding 15 3 20%
Terminations – Voluntary 12 9 75%
Terminations - Involuntary 8 1 12.5%
Source: Developed in work session with DPS staff held on September 10, 2024.
Change Management Plan: This initiative focuses on improving manual work processes and
introducing automation, which directly impacts how staff perform their work. As a result, effective
change management strategies are crucial for the success of this initiative.
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Key Change Management Challenges:
• Resistance to Change: Some employees will be reluctant to adopt new processes and
systems, especially if they involve significant changes to their current workflows.
• Fear of Job Loss: Some employees may fear that automation will lead to job losses, even
though that is not the intention of this effort and not anticipated, or changes in their roles.
• Technical Difficulties: Employees may struggle to adapt to new technologies and systems,
leading to frustration and resistance.
• Lack of Training: Inadequate training and support can hinder the adoption of new processes
and systems.
Overcoming Change Management Challenges:
• Communication and Engagement: Proactively communicate the benefits of the DPS-02 initiatives
and address concerns and questions from employees.
• Employee Involvement: Involve employees in the design and implementation of the new
processes and systems to foster a sense of ownership.
• Training and Support: Provide comprehensive training and ongoing support to help
employees adapt to the new technologies and processes.
• Phased Implementation: Introduce changes gradually to allow employees to adjust to the
new systems and processes at a comfortable pace.
• Change Champions: Identify and empower change staff champions within the organization to
promote the benefits of the initiatives and address employee concerns. Change champions
act as a bridge between employees and DPS, ensuring that changes are communicated
effectively.
• Address Data Privacy Concerns: Implement robust security measures and transparent data
privacy policies to address concerns about data security and privacy.
• Celebrate Successes: Recognize employees for their contributions to the successful
o implementation of the DPS-02 initiatives.
By effectively addressing these change management challenges, this initiative can be successfully
implemented, leading to improved efficiency, reduced costs, and enhanced compliance.
DPS-03: Collaborate with other state agencies to pool purchasing,
maintenance, and instrument calibration
This initiative seeks to have the State of Arkansas leverage its purchasing power by increasing the
economy of scale by pooling the purchasing, maintenance, and calibration of lab instruments.
Presently, three state departments – DPS, the Arkansas Department of Health (ADH), and Arkansas
Department of Agriculture (ADA) use similar lab equipment, yet they each purchase, maintain and
supply this equipment independently. Consolidating the purchasing of these items is expected to
lead to better value for the state.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Today, DPS, ADH, and ADA use specialized
laboratory equipment for a variety of uses, including processing evidence, protecting public health,
and analyzing safety of food products. While these needs are very different, the equipment they use
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is substantially similar. Whether it be Gas Chromatography Mass spectrometers (GCMS), Liquid
Chromatography Mass spectrometers (LCMS), balances, pipettes or other lab tools, there is not a
significant difference between the equipment these departments use daily.
DPS currently operates 20 GCMS instruments at a cost of approximately $100,000 each and 5 LCMS
instruments at a cost of approximately $300,000 each. ADA operates 1 GCMS and 5 LCMS
instruments and their new LCMS this past year was purchased at a cost of $460,000. ADH currently
operates 6 LCMS and 17 GCMS instruments. Their LCMS instruments cost $450,000 each and they
also operate a high-resolution Mass spectrometer at a cost of $900,000. All three departments use
the same manufacturer, Agilent, but ADH also purchases from Thermo, AB Sciex, and Waters.
In addition, each department purchases numerous pipettes, which accurately measure and transfer
small volumes of liquid and ensure reproducibility and accuracy in experiments and procedures, and
balances to assure appropriate and accurate weight measurements:
• DPS: 178 Pipettes in their drug, toxicology and DNA screening;
• ADA: 200 Pipettes; and,
• ADH: Over 350 Pipettes.
Each department reports different pricing for pipettes, ranging from $115 to $1,400 per pipette.
DPS reports that it has numerous balances at a cost of up to $11,000 per balance and they have
purchased 11 this year. ADA has 35 balances, at a cost of $2,500/balance. ADH has 30 balances and
has spent $18,000 on balances over the last three years.
Beyond the purchasing costs, each department pays for maintenance and calibration services
independently, requiring a technician to travel to work on the units, independent of the work of other
departments to do the same maintenance and calibration of their similar units. DPS reports it
spends over $300,000 per year on instrument calibration and maintenance. ADA reports it spends
about $20,000 per year on instrument calibration and ADH reports it spent $100,000 on calibration
services over the last three years.
Moreover, there is no coordination among these departments about overall capacity needs. Each
department develops its testing capacity based upon what it views as its expected and maximum
demand, without considering the overall capacity needs statewide. It is likely that capacity for all
three agencies combined exceeds the overall capacity demand across the state.
Rationale: The laboratory work performed by DPS, ADH, and ADA is substantially similar in terms of
equipment needs. Not taking advantage of pooled purchasing means that the state is likely to be
paying more than necessary. This initiative would move to consolidate the purchase of laboratory
equipment, maintenance and calibration to leverage an economy of scale to enhance the state’s
buying power. Leveraging the purchasing power of three agencies would put the state in a position
to get better pricing, which would result in cost savings and likely result in more consistency with
varying purchasing practices replaced with a uniform strategy. Unifying the calibration and
maintenance schedule will mean fewer trips by highly skilled technicians and will help all three
laboratories maintain their national accreditations.
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This initiative might ultimately move the state toward a shared service model for laboratory services.
Such a move could result in greater savings but would first require additional analysis of the business
needs of each department, which has not yet been done. More uniformity in equipment would also
make it easier for employees to cross train and work in different laboratories.
One additional consideration would be adding the University of Arkansas Medical Center and the
Arkansas’ Children Hospital, which are out of the current scope of Arkansas Forward, to the pool.
Doing so would further strengthen the pool, potentially driving down costs further.
Implementation Considerations:
Pooled purchasing for laboratory services is used by the federal government, through the Laboratory
Integrated Delivery System (LIDS), which works to use the purchasing power of the Department of
Defense (DOD), Veterans Affairs Medical Center (VAMC) and other federal agencies to reduce costs.
For this reason, most manufacturers and laboratory service providers will be accustomed to pooled
purchasing.
Developing initial alignment among the three departments (and the two hospitals if they are added
to the scope of the pool) on a service and calibration schedule is critical, since currently these are
all coordinated independently. TSS would need to take the lead in managing this level of effort
involving consolidated procurement, purchasing and operational collaboration. The three agencies
would need to work with the TSS to develop a Request For Information (RFI) to ascertain the level of
interest from the vendor community. Additionally, if any cases go to ligation through the use of this
specialized equipment it benefits the state to be using the same service and calibration for purposes
of consistency.
Creating a structure to assess if there is enough similarity among the three agencies to consider
moving forward with a shared services model for laboratory service is an important component.
Evaluating the business needs of the three departments to establish if there are synergies that the
state could capture with this model to deliver future savings, better performance and improved
matching of capability to overall demand.
Strategies to Address Potential Risks and Enable Success:
• There may be concern about using a shared contract or pooling purchasing by the other
departments impacted by this initiative. These risks can be addressed if TSS takes the lead in
managing this initiative.
• Change could be disruptive to current calibration and certification standards. This risk can be
mitigated by ensuring that there is a backup/contingency plan as changes in procurement are
being sought to assure systems meet current standards of calibration.
• It may be difficult to calibrate the equipment on the same schedule; there may be an
opportunity all the departments to the same schedule over time or to service all equipment
at the next date in which one department is scheduled for calibration to sync all of the
departments to the same schedule.
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Steps to Implement Changes:
• DPS, ADH, and ADA to establish a work group to begin developing framework for laboratory
equipment pooling initiative and develop plan to take to TSS. The plan would include
assurances to meet current calibration and certification standards for each department.
• TSS Office of State Procurement to take use cases, expectations, future business needs from
DPS, ADH, and ADA to develop the framework for an RFI.
• TSS to develop a funding model to support the contract (e.g., one option would be to
appropriate funds to each department and for the departments to transfer the funds upon
receipt of charges from TSS).
• TSS to issue RFP for pooled purchasing of laboratory services and to include leveraged service
contract rate for any service maintenance and calibration.
• TSS to work with three agencies during the vendor selection process to identify the vendor(s)
that presents the best value proposition.
• If there is a vendor selected that is not an existing vendor, DPS, ADH, and ADA would offer
training on new technologies for staff.
• TSS to coordinate first consolidated calibration of equipment to ensure all agencies are on a
shared schedule.
• TSS to incorporate policies and procedures of all the agencies to keep standardization.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Finding cost savings
through leveraging purchasing power and department collaboration in a shared service model is
aligned with the priorities of all departments.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
There are not expected to be major process changes within the laboratories, though if a different
vendor is selected for equipment purchases, there will likely need to be training for the staff for the
new technology.
At the department level, TSS could likely take over the procurement and purchasing of the
equipment, including service, maintenance and calibration and would need to develop use cases,
establish time frames, define service level expectations and identify future business needs from the
three departments. TSS would issue the RFI and RFP and oversee the procurement process, with
significant input from the impacted departments that use this equipment.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The primary objective of this initiative is to achieve cost savings for laboratory services.
• Total cost for laboratory equipment and supplies; and,
• Total maintenance cost for laboratory equipment and supplies (expected to decrease).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: A 2019 study from The Hackett Group showed that those businesses
operating a “world class procurement” standard save 22% in costs versus their peers, and that
pooling purchasing is a strong component of that cost reduction. While it is unlikely that the State
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would be able to achieve that level of savings, a 10% reduction in the cost of purchases,
maintenance, and calibration has been estimated as achievable from this pooled purchasing.
Change Management Plan: DTSS will need to meet with the three departments to develop a
clear understanding of the business needs of the laboratories and strategy for the purchase of
equipment and plan for maintenance. Obtaining buy-in from the other state departments and
hospitals will be important in achieving the expected cost savings. Figure 16 provides key
communication tasks.
Figure 16 – DPS-03 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
ADH, DPS, and ADA • Each agency can benefit from • Staff emails Office of State
internal staff cost savings and consistency • One-on-one Procurement
by moving to a pooled meetings with key
purchasing model employees Secretary of
• TSS will make sure we receive Health
significant input before we Secretary of
move forward Public Safety
Secretary of
Agriculture
Departmental • TSS will be taking over the • Leadership Office of State
leadership/laboratory contracting of laboratory meetings Procurement
leadership purchasing
• TSS will be working with state Secretary of
agency laboratory leadership Health
to involve them in developing Secretary of
the framework for Public Safety
consolidating the purchasing Secretary of
Agriculture
Governor’s Office • Department heads of the three • Leadership Office of State
agencies to work together meetings Procurement
collaboratively to ensure
success of this initiative Secretary of
Health
Secretary of
Public Safety
Secretary of
Agriculture
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DPS-04: Contract for development of an integrated Computer Aided
Dispatch (CAD) system that interfaces with all current DPS law
enforcement systems
This initiative directs DPS to contract for the development of an integrated CAD system that allows
the DPS state police (state troopers) to access all databases and electronic systems (CAD, E-Crash,
E-Cite, ACIC and Atlas) to improve time management and efficiency by:
• Reducing use of multiple disparate systems;
• Creating a solution for system integration and cross-population of data;
• Designing a system that mirrors the operational workflow; and,
• Standardizing implementation of policy requirements through implementation of a workflow.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Based on DPS’ mission and mandates, state
troopers have a critical need to utilize several databases simultaneously to fulfill essential job
requirements including:
• Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD): Used to receive calls and communication.
• Mobile officer’s virtual environment (MOVE): This computerized portal is in the police
vehicle and allows the officer to enter all information into the system requiring no “hand-
written data”.
• E-Cite (electronic citation system): Used to issue traffic summons and is designed to
interface with the court system and is fully integrated into the MOVE portal.
• E-Crash: Used to enter accident/crash investigation information.
Both E-Cite, E-Crash and E-forms auto-populate driver information from a barcode and magnetic
stripe scan. E-Crash and E-Cite have capabilities to send data directly to the Federal Motor Carrier
Safety Administration (FMCSA) to meet mandates on commercial vehicle enforcement and safety
standards.
State troopers must log into multiple systems before beginning patrol and work functions (i.e., CAD,
E-Crash, E-Cite, ACIC and Atlas). Recent improvements have resulted in use of a single sign-on to
streamline this effort for MOVE components (eCite, eCrash) but ATLAS does require MFA. At the end
of the shift, a state trooper must also log out of each system to prevent unauthorized access.
Meetings with DPS staff resulted in the identification of multiple opportunities for improvement:
• The current CAD system (Computer Aided Dispatch) is an off-the-shelf system that does not
integrate with other systems or databases.
• Currently, not all of the systems interface and cross-populate information from one system
to another (within MOVE, the modules do cross-populate but there is not an interface to
transfer MOVE data to CAD, or vice versa).
• Some systems require cellular / internet which can create issues for state troopers assigned
to rural areas with lack of network availability. Troopers can continue limited operations
offline.
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• The system(s) require manual data entry and do not have voice activation capabilities (there
may be some limitations to use of voice activation within a vehicle due to ambient noise).
Staff prioritized the most important functionality for an improved system:
• One integrated system that allows all systems to interface;
• Improved systems operation time;
• Integration of CAD systems with other systems (i.e., citation and crash management
systems) to enable cross-population of data;
• Overall improved CAD system functionality;
• Ability to work offline in no cellular areas; and,
• Voice activated capabilities and GPS tracking, texting and instantaneous alert notifications.
Rationale: Contracting for development of a CAD system that interfaces with all necessary law
enforcement systems is critical to the effectiveness and efficiency of the state trooper workforce in
a field environment, given their mandate to provide essential services, critical emergency response,
motor vehicle enforcement, criminal investigation and service calls to the citizens and visitors to the
state of Arkansas. Providing state troopers with state-of-the-art technology that allows easy
application, efficiency, accuracy, and time-saving capabilities will enhance operational capabilities
and provide operational time savings which translates to cost avoidance.
Implementation Considerations: There are multiple examples of how state police agencies
have enhanced CAD systems, electronic citation, and crash management systems:
• In August 2023 Kentucky state police integrated a “Native Cloud-based” CAD system that
provided state of the art technology and capabilities. This system allowed interoperability
with other law enforcement agencies and created a cloud base platform to save on
operational costs.
• The Alabama state police have utilized E-Forms, E-Crash and E-cite integrated systems that
tie into the statewide accident reporting system. The Alabama state police work in
conjunction with the University of Alabama to design and implement their systems. Arkansas
state police uses the same system as Alabama and has had a partnership with UA Center for
Advanced Public Safety since 2010.
• The Georgia State Patrol utilizes EPORT and E-cite which allows the public to access law
enforcement reports and citations online for a fee and streamlines the process.
• Several states utilize CAD systems that allow full integration of all law enforcement
functions allowing SSO features, GPS tracking, texting and instantaneous alert notifications.
Steps for establishing new technology (future state):
• Develop interface to facilitate exchange of data between CAD and other systems.
• Investigate opportunities to use voice activated systems to enhance safety and increase time
management (balancing potential benefits with limitations of technology).
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Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
Utilizing an integrated CAD system is a top priority and improving tools available to state troopers
could have a positive impact on productivity and morale. The CAD system is designed to start with
the initial 911 call which allows dispatch to direct the appropriate information to the responding
trooper(s). the information then automatically gets entered in a records management system
allowing for significantly enhanced speed and accuracy of emergency responses.
The CAD system captures critical data for each call and cross populates that information with the
responding trooper(s) information. Upon completion of the call the trooper can enter information
into a data system to write a police report and take any enforcement or investigative action.
Interfaced CAD systems allow for cross population of information which saves time, resources and
accuracy.
A mobile solution that is particularly relevant to law enforcement and public safety personnel is
hands-free operation. The importance of this technology is enhancing safety for the Trooper and
enabling time savings but not having to input data manually. CAD systems can have mobile
capabilities.
To achieve this future state, the following steps are suggested to move the work forward:
• Assess the current CAD system and its capabilities for future enhancement and more
efficiency.
• Research and develop a comprehensive design of merging the E-Crash and E-citation
systems and incorporating the newly designed E-Form under one platform that interfaces
with a CAD system.
• Develop a training curriculum for end user to fully understand system capabilities and
functions.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: DPS state police
have an information technology section leader and staff, with assigned SMEs for each DPS division
to address needs timely. Based on the strategies recommended by stakeholders and DPS’
assessment of its technology feasibility, DPS may require more resources to implement them fully
(estimated by the department to be a cost of $400,000). It is planned that this be accomplished in a
solicitation of services request for a proposal and information through an RFI or RFP to determine
feasibility, cost, and implementation planning.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
Process changes are anticipated due to consolidation of systems. Reconfiguration of systems and
platforms will require thorough testing and gradual implementation to optimize operational use.
System-wide training will be needed for state troopers.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: If implemented, DPS troopers would be able to reduce the time it takes
enter information through the use of voice technology and pre-populated data and this will increase
efficiency. Savings are realized through reduced duplication of data entry on newly created cross
populated systems saving hundreds of hours on crash and criminal investigation time. Using a
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methodology of hours and pay rates it can be assumed that enhanced technology will result in both
cost avoidance and savings to the department by reducing the number of hours required to complete
reports.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The goal of this
initiative is to create and design a system that allows a CAD interface system and consolidates
databases for safety, security, efficiency, and cost savings:
• State trooper satisfaction (expected to increase); and,
• Percent of state trooper time spent performing administrative functions (expected to
decrease).
Change Management Plan: Employee adherence to the new systems integration, use and
function ability and how to use it are an important part of implementation. Utilization of an easy-to-
use system that makes it easier for state troopers to perform and complete their required tasks and
missions in a timely fashion will provide safety and security will allow for seamless integration and
application. Messaging and modalities planned for each audience are included in Figure 17.
Figure 17 – DPS-04 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Responsible Parties
State troopers • Benefits of the new • Departmental • CIO
system/system • Staff meetings • Communication
changes • Virtual Director
• Timeline for meetings or
implementation roadshow
• How to use the system • Memos
• How to access training • Website
resources
DPS-05: Strengthen and Expand the Leadership Academy
This initiative focuses on strengthening and expanding the DPS Leadership Academy. The academy’s
goal is to address leadership skills at various levels for all agency divisions. The curriculum’s focus is
on leadership skills that can be applied to any manager in any division and is not specific to
procedures of any one division.
Initiative Overview and Current State: In early 2024, DPS implemented its Leadership
Academy, developed for all DPS personnel, including newly hired employees, whether law
enforcement or civilian, and statewide local law enforcement officers. Components of the
curriculum are embedded in the Arkansas state police Academy (ASP), which trains DPS law
enforcement recruits, and the Arkansas Commission on Law Enforcement Standards and Training
(CLEST) Academy, which trains statewide local law enforcement officers.
The Leadership Academy’s curriculum was designed by three DPS personnel: the Director of
Research and Planning Division, the Director of CLEST, and the Director of the Administrative
Services Division. It was significantly influenced by the PhD dissertation of the Director of Research
and Planning Division regarding his study of the impact of burnout in the workplace. Significant best
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
practice research determined the content of the curriculum, including the United States Marine
Corps’ 11 Principles of Leadership.1 Holistic wellness is a common theme in the curriculum, and
spousal participation in one of the courses contributes to the wellness theme.
The Leadership Academy offers four levels of training designed for personnel at various points in their
careers: new hires, and employees at the three, five, and seven-year service marks. The developers
incorporated a strong presence of wellness in each of the courses, at all levels. The academy also
offers a course that specifically addresses individual wellness including physical, emotional,
relational, spiritual, and financial wellness. Other more traditional leadership topics include:
• Communication;
• Conflict resolution;
• Decision-making;
• Leading across generations; and,
• Organizational change.
The Leadership Academy offers a variety of interchangeable courses structured in 16-hour
increments. Customers (internal teams or external law enforcement entities) choose the courses
they would like to take and the training team delivers training on the requested courses.
DPS trained upwards of 500 participants in the first eight months of the Leadership Academy’s
existence. These participants were trained in two separate genres: the ASP recruit academy and
statewide local law enforcement entities. The majority of ASP Captains and Lieutenants have
attended the Foundations of Leadership core training. To date, the Leadership Academy has not been
made available for civilian personnel.
The DPS secretary, Col. Mike Hagar, requires all ASP law enforcement staff who wish to be
considered for promotion to complete specific core components of the Leadership Academy, to
include The Principles of Law Enforcement Leadership and Effective Decision-making for Law
Enforcement Leaders. Candidates receive study guides to help them prepare for questions that
must be answered correctly in written and oral exams to be considered for promotion.
Outcomes data are not yet available for the Academy due to the recency of its implementation. DPS
has begun collecting qualitative data from Academy participants, and leadership reports that early
feedback has been positive.
DPS contracts with the University of Arkansas at Little Rock (UALR) for data analysis on a variety of
topics. The team includes a Professor/Associate Dean and PhD researcher, who collect DPS
employee data via surveys and then conduct analysis. Findings are then presented to the Executive
Team and the Research and Planning Division Director to inform necessary revisions to the
curriculum. DPS has requested that UALR collect and analyze data on the Leadership Academy and
surveys are scheduled to be ready for distribution to Leadership Academy participants this Fall.
Resources for the Leadership Academy are limited, as there is no specific budget for this purpose.
The three developers/trainers maintain positions with many other duties and responsibilities. They
receive no additional pay for this work. A portion of federal grant funding ($125,000 per year) has been
U. S. Marine Corps, https://www.usmcu.edu/Portals/218/Fidelity-%20Leadership%20Principles.pdf.
1
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
allotted to cover travel expenses and training materials. All other costs are absorbed within the
existing DPS budget. The Leadership Academy materials are not currently available online. Making
materials available online could expand access to the training in a cost-effective manner.
Rationale: The DPS Secretary expressed that the expansion of the Leadership Academy is a high
priority. While the Leadership Academy has already been implemented, it is in its infancy. The
recommendations outlined in this strategic plan are intended to assist DPS in further development
of the Leadership Academy by:
• Establishing program goals and desired outcomes (define key performance indicators):
• Reviewing curriculum to make improvements (e.g., reviewing content on employee well-
being, including spiritual well-being to ensure neutrality of content);
• Expanding departmental succession planning: The Leadership Academy offers a four-hour
succession planning course for senior and executive leaders only. However, DPS has not
formalized expectations that succession planning be implemented for every division and
team. Using the available course, DPS can establish an internal requirement that every
leader take the course and begin planning in their area. Best practices indicate that
succession planning is a key step in preparing staff for promotion at all levels, and that
supervisors at every level should be discussing succession planning with their staff. A variety
of tools are available to assist management in developing succession plans. The Academy to
Innovate Human Resources (AIHR) has identified best practices for succession planning,
some of which are listed below:2
o Start early and plan continuously:
o Develop a formal succession plan;
o Involve senior leadership;
o Identify key positions and skills;
o Assess the current talent;
o Invest in professional development; and,
o Implement mentoring and coaching programs.
• Connecting the training to staff performance evaluations to provide a mechanism for
supervisors to measure whether staff are using skills learned in the academy;
• Conducting a formal program evaluation of outcomes such as through collection of training
evaluations and satisfaction surveys and implementing pre- and post-training assessments
to measure whether the training is effective in increasing participant’s knowledge in key
domains; and,
• Implementing further program improvements based on data.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A - DPS Work Plan provides the action steps
in the planned sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation
process identified through interviews and work sessions with DPS staff and review of best practices
research.
The Academy to Innovate Human Resources, 11 Succession Planning Best Practices to Follow in 2024,
2
Monique Verduyn, https://www.aihr.com/blog/succession-planning-best-practices/
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• Lack of dedicated funding makes expansion or enhancement of the program challenging. The
department may seek federal or grant funds to support the program’s growth over time.
• Because DPS does not have dedicated staff to operate the academy, expanding it may be
challenging given other workload or priorities. Using a “Train the Trainer” model may be a
cost-effective way to expand the program.
• Because DPS has not performed a full program evaluation, the department does not have
access to data to improve the academy’s training curriculum and operations. In addition, the
DPS Director of Research and Planning expressed his goal of expanding the Leadership
Academy to all Arkansas Departments after full vetting, implementation and funding is
accomplished. Strong positive performance data and additional funding will be key in
establishing collaboration with other Departments for this purpose.
Steps for developing and revising a Leadership Academy (future state):
The steps to implement this initiative have been informed by these potential risks and proposed
solutions:
• Utilize or expand the existing contract with UALR to assist in the change process. A number
of the steps below could be completed by these university partners.
• Determine data collection variables that indicate the impact of the training on staff and
department culture.
• Create metrics for key performance indicators that inform based on data collected.
• Use data collected to adjust leadership curricula to ensure each curriculum is appropriate for
the staff in attendance (i.e., ASP, civilian staff, CLEST staff, external law enforcement
customers).
• Expand succession planning courses to reflect additional best practices in talent targeting
and career development, including beginning succession planning early in an employee's
career and utilizing mentors and coaches to assist in supervisory development.
• Develop and implement a “Train the Trainer” program for the Leadership Academy to ensure
the goal of training all DPS staff and the external customers is met. Draw from exceptional
DPS leaders as well as statewide local law enforcement leaders with the appropriate skills.
• Research and apply for grant funding for the Leadership Academy.
• Review which courses could be delivered online and digitize the portions of leadership training
that can be made available online.
• Prepare a report on the first 500 staff trained for executive leadership review. Include the data
collected and the performance indicator results to date. Revise curricula based on findings.
• After full implementation and vetting, explore the feasibility of offering expanded leadership
training to other departments.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative is one
of the top priorities for DPS and seeks to provide quality leadership training to internal law
enforcement and civilian staff, as well as statewide local law enforcement officers. While the Training
Academy is currently in progress, the developers are refining it based on training experiences and
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
participant feedback. As the Training Academy becomes fully operational and expands, additional
resources will be required.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
This initiative is expected to improve and expand leadership academy functions but is not otherwise
expected to result in process changes.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: DPS will require additional
resources to fully implement the Training Academy as it was intended. It is estimated that three
additional training staff will be required, as well as funding for travel and equipment, to meet the
demand of training all DPS personnel, all law enforcement officers throughout the state, and
developing and conducting a Train the Trainer program. The cost is estimated to be $500,000 per year.
DPS plans to increase grant applications and awards requests to offset the cost to DPS. Making
training materials available online will also be an additional cost.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to continue development and implementation of a Leadership Academy
for a wide variety of stakeholders. One key part of the initiative is to define key performance indicators
for the training academy. Some of the key performance measures could include:
• Satisfaction rate of those completing training;
• Retention rate of those completing training (after one year);
• Promotion rate of those completing training;
• Turnover rate of the units where the leader has completed training; and,
• Number/rate of leaders whose pre- and post-course tests demonstrate an increased score
(transfer of learning).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: Indeterminate long-term savings could be achieved if the Leadership
Academy is successful in helping supervisors target qualified leadership candidates and in
improving the quality of DPS leaders through training. DPS could see a reduction in unit-level turnover
if the leadership cohort of the organization becomes stronger at managing their teams as a result of
the training.
Change Management Plan: Once DPS defines the goals and expected outcomes for the
training, and when the department is ready for a larger expansion, clear communication with staff
about the program is needed. Key activities and timing for the communication plan are included in
Appendix A – DPS Work Plan and summarized in Figure 18.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 8 – DPS-05 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
DPS Supervisors All staff are expected to Meetings Secretary and
attend 16 hours of the Director of Research
Training Academy. We and Planning
have implemented
training for law
enforcement officers and
will develop and
implement courses for
civilian employees in the
future.
The goal is to develop
leadership skills across
all levels of employees.
ASP Law Enforcement You are required to Meetings, policy revision Secretary Director of
Officers attend core foundational Research and
courses of the Planning, and
Leadership Academy Supervisors
before promotion.
Written and verbal testing
will include components
of the Leadership
Academy courses.
The goal is to ensure
those seeking promotion
have developed
leadership skills to
prepare them for the
additional
responsibilities of the
new position.
All DPS Staff All staff are expected to Meetings, emails Supervisors
attend 16 hours of the
Training Academy. We
have implemented
training for law
enforcement officers and
will develop and
implement courses for
civilian employees in the
future.
The goal is to develop
leadership skills across
all levels of employees.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
DPS-06: Focus on talent targeting and career development.
This initiative focuses on DPS’ ability to target and attract employees. DPS would like to develop career
paths and empower staff to continually learn new skills. DPS would also like to create specific
enhancements for specialized positions like the Arkansas Crime Laboratory (Crime Lab) scientists and
Information Technology (IT) personnel.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Today, DPS struggles with recruitment and retention
of employees across divisions. Certain specialized positions are experiencing exceptionally high
turnover rates. Leadership believes there are a variety of factors that contribute to this issue, some
of which include:
• The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) requires that all departments post most vacant
positions, regardless of grade, externally, meaning that if a department has a number of
qualified applicants within the department, they still must advertise and interview outside
applicants. There are some exceptions to this (for example, departments do not have to post
GS-13 or above, IT-08 or above, etc.). Departments may petition OPM for a waiver to allow
them to post only internally, but OPM does not allow waivers for management positions. This
practice may have some benefits but it is costly in management hours and inefficient for staff
involved in the hiring process statewide.
• Typically, salaries are only increased by promotion to a managerial position. As a result, staff
who would prefer not to move into management are forced to do so to increase wages,
creating an unintended consequence of losing staff qualified for non-management positions
who may not have the desire or the skill set to promote to management.
• The Crime Lab employs approximately 118 scientists, with an additional number of scientists
who serve in supervisory roles. Scientists are trained in forensic processes and often leave for
more lucrative lab positions. As of September 2024, 21 non-supervisory scientists, or 18
percent have left DPS employment this year.
• The Arkansas State Police (ASP) typically operates two recruit schools per fiscal year (July
through June). Despite this practice, it has been difficult to recruit and retain law enforcement
officers.
o Currently, ASP has 92 vacant trooper positions. The upcoming recruit school,
beginning in October 2024, has capacity for 70 recruits, but only 54 attendees.
Notwithstanding the current need, future vacancies, and an approximate 50 percent
graduation rate exacerbate the problem.
o ASP reports that the first year of a trooper's employment costs approximately
$200,000 for training, equipment, and salary. The turnover rate for ASP for FY 2024
(ending June 30, 2024) was 9.18 percent, resulting in an indeterminate negative
financial impact for the investment of resources necessary to fill those vacancies.
• ASP leadership also expressed that it is difficult to recruit and retain law enforcement
officers, as the starting salary is lower than most other law enforcement agencies. An
example is the ASP starting salary is $54,000 annually, compared to $67,500 for the Arkansas
Capitol Police.
DPS contracts with the University of Arkansas at Little Rock (UALR) for data analysis and on a variety
of topics including the newly created Leadership Academy and department culture change. The
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Team collects DPS employee data via surveys and then conduct analysis. Findings are then
presented to the Executive Team and the Division leaders affected by the feedback. This process
informs leadership through employee input and provides opportunities for employees to participate
in department decision-making.
DPS has used exit interviews in the past but suspended that process. The Crime Lab currently is the
only division that utilizes exit interviews. However, DPS is in the process of implementing a new
department-wide online interview that is expected to be implemented within the next few weeks. The
department plans to use the data collected to gauge employee satisfaction and to identify issues
with supervisors.
Rationale: While pay is one factor in recruiting and retaining employees, DPS leadership realizes
other strategies could be utilized to improve the employee experience and possibly increase
retention. DPS needs to develop strategies for targeting talent and career development. However,
because DPS does not have an appropriation to support monetary incentives, DPS must seek other
avenues to improve recruitment and retention of employees. Building on the relationship with UALR,
DPS may utilize UALR to assist with some of the action steps required to implement this initiative.
Implementation Considerations: Appendix A - DPS Work Plan provides the action steps
in the planned sequence for implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation
process identified through interviews and work sessions with DPS staff and review of best practices
research include:
Gallup Inc. and Workhuman collaborated to study employee recognition compared to employee
performance outcomes across many organizations.3 They found that various factors influence
employee performance, and that employees at all levels were motivated by both extrinsic and
intrinsic factors.4 Extrinsic factors, such as payment for work accomplished, are the motivators
employers often consider most in retention policy. While it is true that employees work to live,
extrinsic factors are not the sole employee motivators. Intrinsic motivators like recognition and
praise communicate value and appreciation to employees making them feel empowered and often
leading to increased productivity. The study found that work felt intrinsically engaging when people:5
• Liked the work they did;
• Liked the people they worked for and with; and
• Saw the meaning in and the purpose of their efforts.
Gallup, Inc. and Workhuman found recognition supports all three of those criteria by celebrating
individual work, bonding teams together, and connecting personal achievement to organizational
3
From Praise to Profits: The Business Case for Recognition at Work, Gallup, Inc and Workhuman, 2023,
https://www.workhuman.com/resources/reports-guides/from-praise-to-profits-workhuman-gallup-report/.
4
ibid
5
ibid
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
success.6 However, the study found that globally, only one in four employees strongly agreed that
they received recognition or praise for doing good work in the previous week.7
Succession planning is a key step in preparing staff for promotion. A variety of tools are available to
assist management in developing succession plans. The Academy to Innovate Human Resources
(AIHR) has identified best practices for succession planning, some of which are listed below:8
● Start early and plan continuously:
● Develop a formal succession plan;
● Involve senior leadership;
● Identify key positions and skills;
● Assess the current talent;
● Invest in professional development; and
● Implement mentoring and coaching programs.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
DPS leadership will need to manage the change process with unified support for shifting to an
intrinsic rewards approach. Leadership believes that there will be few barriers to success, with the
exception of lack of buy-in from some supervisors. However, this will be minimal if Executive
Leadership agrees to the planned changes. DPS leadership plans to develop a detailed
communication plan to unify stakeholders and achieve successful implementation that outlines the
“why” behind the change.
Steps for focusing on talent targeting and career development (future state):
The planned steps to implement this initiative have been informed by these potential risks and
proposed solutions:
• Examine and improve the Academy graduation success rate. Implement changes and target
a graduation rate of at least 75%.
• Utilize or expand the existing contract with UALR to assist in the change process. A number
of the steps below could be completed by these university partners.
• Develop a succession plan template and process. Add succession planning as a component
of leadership training.
• Survey specialized position staff like Crime Lab and IT professionals to collect date on the
types of intrinsic rewards that motivate them.
• Continue to negotiate with OPM for more flexibility in externally posting select vacancies.
• Continue development and implementation of the online exit interview for departing staff.
Use information collected to inform process changes.
• Develop metrics to define successful retention.
• Identify new sources of talent by developing partnerships with additional universities and
community organizations and develop strategies to engage with these sources.
6
ibid
7
ibid
8
Monique Verduyn, Academy to Innovate Human Resources, “11 Succession Planning Best Practices to Follow
in 2024,” https://www.aihr.com/blog/succession-planning-best-practices/.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Participate in community job fairs.
• Develop non-financial recruiting incentives to attract new talent, such as flexible work
schedules, etc. Adjust policies as necessary.
• Implement a volunteer mentoring program where high performing experienced staff will meet
with less experienced staff to answer questions, offer guidance, and provide feedback.
• Create volunteer opportunities for employees to work in teams to develop recommendations
for internal process improvements. Examples are:
o No-cost incentives to improve retention (alternative work schedules, how important
messages are communicated, wellness activities, etc.);
o Processes to improve department/division culture;
o Research and discussion of literature on leadership skills, or any other appropriate
topic; and,
o Allow high performing experienced staff to assist management with first-line review
of work products (proofreading, edit suggesting, etc.) to develop management skills.
While these teams may be useful to inform leadership of new ideas and proposals, the additional
benefit is a cost-free study to identify individuals with an interest in and skills for leadership that
allows DPS to determine the level of investment to make in its employees.
• Train management in recognition practices that provide intrinsic rewards and facilitate
positive staff engagement. Use recognition frequently. Look for small accomplishments or
improvements.
• Celebrate an employee of the week for performance, going above and beyond, or helping
someone in need. Give them a shout out with a brief description of their accomplishment via
email or newsletter. Ensure the winner is not always the same. Look for small
accomplishments or improvements to reward.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative is one
of the top priorities for DPS and seeks to develop and implement processes to attract new talent and
retain existing employees through positive reinforcement and skills development. Implementation
will require support from all levels of leadership.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
Talent targeting process improvements will require new approaches to recruitment, including a
variety of incentives for attracting individuals who may not previously have considered employment
with DPS and forging additional relationships with external stakeholders, like universities and
community groups. Career development may require a paradigm shift in retention strategies from a
focus on the barriers to monetary-based incentives to a more creative and intrinsically motivational
approach.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: DPS expects to be able to
implement the recommendations to increase intrinsic motivators and improve talent targeting with
no significant additional financial resources.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The expected impacts of this initiative are to focus on talent targeting and career development for
DPS employees and to improve recruitment and retention outcomes. Some of the key performance
measures include:
• Turnover rate by unit/division - compare rates pre- and post-implementation (expected to
decrease);
• Number of internal promotions by division – compare pre- and post-implementation
(expected to increase);
• Performance evaluations/ratings (expected to improve); and,
• Employee satisfaction rate (expected to improve).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: Indeterminate long-term positive expected impact, but likely substantial
savings, could be achieved if the improvements in talent targeting, employee recognition,
empowerment, and succession planning lead to an increase in employee retention.
As the example in Figure 9 shows, DPS could significantly increase the number of graduates by
improving recruitment and employee practices (which impacts the number of individuals beginning
each academy) and improving the graduation rate (which impacts the number of individuals
completing each academy). In time, this could result in a cost savings as the number of cadets
trained would decrease if State Troopers are retained.
Today, there are two academies per year and for the purpose of this estimate, it is assumed that future
academy sizes are the same as the first academy size in fiscal year 2025 (54), scheduled for Fall 2024.
Since the beginning of FY 2025 Academy 1 is imminent, this estimate assumes the department will
not have made changes to recruitment and retention practices. For the FY 2025 Academy 2 (Spring
2026), this estimate assumes the graduation rate would increase from 50 percent to 65 percent
through implementation of process improvements. This would result in an additional 8 cadets
graduating compared to a scenario where no action is taken. This analysis assumes that for the two
classes in FY 2026, DPS will be able to improve recruitment practices, enabling a 10% increase in the
number of cadets beginning the class and that the graduation rate will continue to increase with each
class, until it reaches the goal of 75 percent graduation.
As previously stated, the cost of training, equipping, and salary of the first year of a state trooper’s
career costs approximately $200,000. Assuming that training and equipment specific to the
individual (uniforms, name tags, and excluding general equipment costs (vehicles and in-car
technology) equals 35 percent of the total cost, it is estimated that for each trooper retained would
create a savings of $70,000. However, savings would not be realized immediately, but over time as
the need for academies would decrease.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 9 – Potential Impact on State Police Graduation Rates
Change Management Plan: This initiative may include the establishment of uniform
processes. Clear communication with staff about the purpose of the changes will accompany any
information on the new process changes. Key activities and timing for the communication plan are
included in Appendix A – DPS Work Plan and summarized in Figure 19.
Figure 19 – DPS-06 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
DPS Leadership Team We are developing new Meetings Secretary and
processes for recruiting Human Resources
and retaining staff. Some Administrator
of these are non-
traditional and will
require a shift in focus
from monetary based
motivations.
This effort is expected to
improve effectiveness
and efficiency.
DPS Supervisors We are developing new Meetings DPS Leadership
processes for recruiting Human Resources
and retaining staff. Some Administrator
of these are non-
traditional and will
require a shift in focus
from monetary based
motivations.
This effort is expected to
improve effectiveness
and efficiency.
All DPS Staff You are valued and your Daily interactions Supervisors
work is appreciated. between staff and
supervisors
DPS-07: Understand current obstacles to decommissioning state police
vehicles
This initiative directs DPS state police to enhance and improve the fleet procedures for removing
surplus state police and equipment attached to the state police vehicles that are no longer usable.
The initiative includes establishing time frames for vehicle/equipment disposal that meet state
requirements and benefit the agency and the state by improving time management and efficiency.
This initiative aims to:
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Streamline processing times in coordination with the State Surplus Program (M&R) for the
disposal of state police vehicles;
• Deploy new vehicle fleet vehicles consistent with state rules on vehicles;
• Implement a strategy to govern removal, sale, and destruction of obsolete fleet equipment
(sirens, light bars and radios) for more efficiency and cost savings;
• Maximize value from the state’s purchasing agreements for fleet equipment; and,
• Standardize implementation of fleet policy and procedures with TSS, DFA, and Arkansas
state police through implementation of a workflow with timelines.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Currently the state police fleet is operated under the
supervision of one state police command officer. Vehicles are procured, owned, managed. and
maintained by DPS. The Arkansas state police have over 1,200 vehicles in their fleet, which
represents 30% of the State of Arkansas’ entire fleet. State police vehicles are unique and require
specialized capabilities in design and functionality including radio systems, light bars, siren systems,
security cages, and the mobile officer’s virtual environment (“MOVE” - the computer systems that
state troopers use to do their work). These vehicles are used daily for long periods of time both in the
idling mode and patrol mode, causing wear and tear on the vehicle engine. Vehicles acquire high
mileage and require continuous maintenance due to constant use. Additionally, an aging fleet is
expensive to maintain. Equipment attached to these vehicles require constant service or
replacement. State police need a more time efficient system to replace and outfit new state police
fleet vehicles and equipment to fulfill mission goals. These goals include:
● State police fleet management system of transitioning expired fleet in a timely manner.
● Efficient deployment of a new state police fleet.
● Fleet telematics upgrading to enhance life expectancy of vehicles through proper
maintenance and service.
● Design and review systems of disposal of obsolete fleet equipment.
● Review state bidding procedures of specialized state police equipment for vehicles.
● Establish protocols and adjust manpower on removing obsolete equipment from vehicles for
disposal in a timely manner.
Today, TSS operates the Arkansas State Surplus function (M&R). TSS is responsible for disposing of
or selling surplus property, including state police vehicles. TSS can typically receive up to 15 vehicles
at a time (given parking lot size limitations). This can cause delays for state police to deploy new
vehicles to the field. Because there is a cap on how many vehicles they can have in their fleet at a
given time, any delay of transferring surplus vehicles to M&R restricts the deployment of new
vehicles.
One factor impacting the duration of the surplus process is the removal of specialized equipment in
state police vehicles. TSS does not have the capacity to remove the equipment prior to resale of the
vehicle (i.e., lights, cages, and computer/radio equipment) and typically DPS has removed this
equipment prior to sending the vehicles to M&R. The process to remove equipment is extremely time
consuming because it includes radio equipment, wiring, cages, safety equipment built into the
vehicle and removal of technical light bars and sirens in each car. This equipment can either be
reused in existing vehicles or sold in the M&R “Cop Shop”. If re-used, there is an administrative
requirement directing DPS to obtain permission from TSS prior to re-use (Rule 1, 19-11-242). There
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
are no clear criteria or use of cost-benefit analysis to govern whether equipment is re-used or sold.
The transfer process also requires paperwork transfer of all equipment information to M&R and a
scheduled pick up of the equipment to be transferred to a different location for destruction or sale.
In addition to re-using equipment made available through the decommissioning process, DPS also
has an option to purchase new specialized law enforcement equipment and supplies. Recently, the
State of Arkansas entered into a contract to enable departments to access such supplies at a discount.
Under the TIPS Emergency Responder Supplies, Equipment, and Services contract, departments can
purchase many types of equipment, with examples including Breathing Systems; Cleaning Equipment
and Supplies; Communications Equipment; Emergency Medical Equipment and Supplies, Emergency
Warning Lights, Lightbars and Sirens; Fire Hoses, Nozzles, Appliances, Adapters and Accessories; Fire
Suppression Equipment and Supplies; Firefighting and Rescue Equipment, Tools and Supplies;
Generators and Emergency Lighting; Miscellaneous Loose Emergency Supplies; Personal Protective
Equipment; Public Safety Equipment and Supplies.
Meetings with DPS staff resulted in the identification of multiple opportunities for improvement:
• DPS state police recommend streamlining the vehicle surplus system and removing
restrictions on how many vehicles can be set up for surplus with M&R in a certain period to
avoid cap issues.
• Resource personnel to remove equipment from surplus state police vehicle systems.
• Increase familiarity with TIPS contract and process for purchasing new equipment at a
discount through training.
• Upgrade telematics and maintenance systems to allow for more efficient use of vehicles and
better longevity of the fleet.
Staff prioritized the most important functionality for an improved system:
• Design a more efficient process to surplus vehicles;
• Reduce time to remove and dispose of fleet equipment in surplus vehicles;
• Create a specialized bidding process for unique law enforcement fleet and fleet equipment;
• Improve telematics and maintenance for vehicles;
• Improve efficient deployment of new state police vehicles; and,
• Collaborate with M&R on fleet operations and work with TSS on fleet management.
Rationale: DPS has a goal to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of fleet management in
alignment with statewide TSS fleet management and procurement policies and procedures. The state
police workforce works in a field environment, given their mandate to provide essential services, critical
emergency response, motor vehicle enforcement, criminal investigation and service calls to the citizens
and visitors of the state of Arkansas. Providing state troopers with vehicles that are properly maintained,
have proper law enforcement functioning equipment and meet and exceed safety standards is
paramount to the proper fulfillment of core job functions and responsibilities. Due to the nature of the
heavy use of these vehicles for law enforcement purposes (e.g., police pursuits, driven in inclement
weather, high mileage, idling and extreme wear and tear) it is critical that proper fleet management be
prioritized.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Implementation Considerations:
A review of other state police agency fleet management revealed there are multiple examples of best
practices can help DPS improve fleet management:
Consistently maintain clear and effective policies: Document clear, easy-to-follow policies for
all aspects of DPS fleet use and management. Clearly written and easy-to-follow policies can
streamline a significant portion of fleet management's communication and enforcement work.
Measure, record, and monitor usage statistics: Collecting data helps optimize fleet utilization and
make informed vehicle and parts purchasing decisions. While specific metrics will vary based on
agency needs, there are several universal data points that every fleet manager can track:
• Fuel usage—Gather data on fueling dates, locations, fuel type, quantity, and associated
costs.
• Driver performance—Document all accident-related information, including dates, times,
locations, and accident nature. Record the involved personnel and any insurance claim
details.
• Maintenance—Keep track of both scheduled and unscheduled repairs. Document details
such as the work required, maintenance dates, parts used, their costs, and labor expenses.
• Purchasing —Maintain records of contract and warranty details for each purchased vehicle.
• Focus on preventative maintenance -- Don’t wait until fleet vehicles need significant
repairs. Create a preventative maintenance schedule for all vehicles. Fleet-wide preventative
maintenance is more cost-effective in the long run.
• Police vehicle maintenance good practices - Optimize fleet size. Maintaining too many
police patrol vehicles strains finances while having too few can hinder operational efficiency.
Maintain enough capacity to accommodate law enforcement emergencies and unexpected
vehicle downtime.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
DPS leadership will need to use effective change management to improve the process for managing
and disposing of vehicles and equipment. DPS needs to work and comply with TSS on the statewide
fleet management operations. Under the current system state police remove parts from vehicles that
they are preparing to send to surplus. This can be coordinated with M&R to alleviate issues of time
delays for the transfer of vehicles. DPS leadership will develop a detailed plan to work with
stakeholders and achieve successful improvement in the implementation of fleet operations. DPS
plans to improve the process and require consistent adherence to improved policies. It is imperative
that state police work with TSS and DFA to maintain consistency with statewide policy and
procedures with Fleet management.
Steps for establishing a redistribution process for agency fleet (future state):
• Align with Arkansas statewide fleet management plan with the state police fleet operations.
• Establish a recurring working group between DPS, DFA, and TSS to address fleet needs and
surplus.
• Develop a comprehensive strategy to maintain the DPS fleet, driven by data-informed criteria
on when to decommission vehicles, when to re-use versus sell parts.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
o Establish criteria and policy in collaboration with TSS on removing parts and
equipment from fleet vehicles that are scheduled to be decommissioned. This
process will guide staff in determining whether removing parts and equipment to be
re-purposed in another vehicle is financially beneficial and worth the investment of
time to remove the parts.
• Review opportunities for purchasing police equipment through a new statewide TIPS
Emergency Responder Supplies, Equipment, and Services contract and engage OSP for
assistance in meeting DPS’s ongoing equipment needs.
• Create a process with M&R to streamline removal of excess state police vehicles in a timely
manner consistent with administrative rules. Establish process mapping to alleviate time
delays. This could include addressing staffing to expedite removal of state police surplus
equipment from vehicles.
• Utilize best practices to enhance longevity of fleet and monitor proper maintenance and
service.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: DPS state police
has a fleet manager who is a commissioned officer with a staff of nine. Based on the strategies
recommended by stakeholders and DPS assessment of its fleet management systems, DPS may
require more resources to improve the fleet management process. As an example, there is a limited
number of inmates assigned to remove excess equipment from fleet vehicles causing delays in the
decommissioning process.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
Process changes are anticipated due to this initiative. DPS will need to work with TSS on fleet
management and procurement policies and procedures to effectuate change. state police are
different from other state agencies in needs and services due to the nature of the use of their fleet.
TSS will need to adapt planning to assist state troopers in managing their unique requirements to
ensure the DPS fleet meets and exceeds safety standards and need for heavy use of police vehicles
and equipment.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: If implemented, DPS state police could realize savings in multiple areas:
• Cost of maintaining an aging fleet is almost triple that of newer fleet based on year of vehicle
• Cost of fuel and maintenance is realized through statewide purchasing plan (with TSS)
• Procurement cost of specialized police vehicle equipment will decrease with the statewide
contract
• Processes in place to streamline disposal of vehicles and equipment will bring savings
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The goal of this initiative is to implement a strategic framework that replaces decommissioned vehicles
efficiently, while ensuring an efficient and cost-effective approach to decommissioning police vehicles
and law enforcement equipment. Performance measures that can be used to measure the success of
this initiative include:
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Time to dispose of decommissioned state police vehicles and equipment (expected to
decrease);
• The percent of DPS fleet that is unusable (expected to decrease); and,
• Cost of purchasing new vehicles and equipment using the statewide contract (expected to
decrease).
Change Management Plan: DPS state police will need to implement a series of efforts to
improve the agency’s disposal of surplus vehicles and the law enforcement equipment attached to
the vehicles. New practices and processes will enable state police to effectively manage fleet
numbers consistent with state mandates and continue to equip vehicles to ensure troopers in the
field have the safest vehicles and equipment to perform their duties. Implementation of fleet
management strategies to track fuel usage, mileage, preventative maintenance, driver usage and
vehicle warranties is important to the success of agency goals and budgeting. Overall consistent
enforcement of designated fleet management policies and procedures is imperative. Additionally,
working with TSS, DFA, and other stakeholders to streamline processing times will allow for a more
effective and efficient fleet management system and operation.
This initiative does not require a separate communication plan.
DPS-08: Enhance operational efficiency of the abuse and neglect hotline
This initiative seeks to consider whether the operational efficiency and effectiveness of the State’s
Abuse and Neglect Hotline can be improved by providing resources to hotline operators for instances
when a report does not reach the statutory standard of abuse or neglect, but the family involved may
require some assistance. Without such assistance, it is likely that some of these calls will be
repeated and the situation could deteriorate into validated cases of abuse and neglect, requiring
significant intervention by the Department of Public Safety (DPS) or the Department of Human
Services (DHS). In addition, the initiative includes a study on the organizational structure and design
of state child abuse hotline functions.
The interventions identified for consideration in this initiative include training and improved tools
provided to Hotline operators including through the Structured Decision Making (SDM) assessment.
Additionally, offering training, in collaboration with DHS, to mandatory reporters could give them the
knowledge of available programs and provide them with tools to refer families to assistance in
appropriate situations rather than making a report, reducing the number of calls made to the hotline.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Arkansas statute requires certain individuals
including doctors, teachers, clergy, and school counselors to report suspected abuse and neglect to
the state’s Abuse and Neglect Hotline and designates these individuals as “mandatory reporters.”
The Crimes Against Children Division’s Abuse and Neglect Hotline is located within DPS; many other
states locate this hotline within the child welfare agency. Presently, the Hotline receives
approximately 5,300 calls per month from mandatory reporters, according to the Q2 2024 DPS data.
Operators receiving these calls use an SDM assessment tool to determine how to route the call. The
disposition of the total number of yearly calls breakdown as follows:
• 48.5% of calls fail to meet the statutory standard of abuse and neglect and are “screened
out,” meaning no other action is taken;
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• 9.6% of calls are referred to DPS Crimes Against Children Division (CACD); and,
• 41.9% of calls are referred to the state’s child welfare agency (DHS) for action.
Presently, there is no mechanism in place or standard criteria developed, either in the SDM tool or
in the training for operators, to provide referrals to community services for families in need in those
cases where the reported evidence does not meet the definition of potential abuse or neglect. This
gap allows the potential deterioration of conditions that may ultimately lead to a future founded case
of abuse or neglect. The hotline today does not have a focus on prevention, which is a priority for the
Governor and the state’s child welfare system generally.
Additionally, there is no regular training made available to mandatory reporters relative to the
availability of community services, either offered through DHS or the ADH, Maternal Health program.
There are numerous free and low-cost non-profit, community, county, and state social service
programs that could provide support on underlying family needs such as food insecurity, housing,
employment programs, and mental health and substance abuse services. These programs may have
the potential to reduce some of the stressors and address some of the risk factors that may
contribute to abuse and neglect. However, many mandatory reporters are unaware of the
community resources available to help some of these families. Agencies may be able to collaborate
to develop an appropriate training curriculum that could be used to help mandatory reporters
routinely identify programs available in their area, as well as make them aware of the availability of
various electronic referral systems that could be helpful in finding resources. Training for mandatory
reporters may be able to reduce the number of unfounded reports and, more importantly, connect
families in need with necessary services to ensure that children and families get resources to meet
their needs and prevent future instances of abuse or neglect.
This initiative is therefore to consider whether 1) additional protocols can be added to the Hotline for
cases that do not meet current thresholds for intervention, 2) additional training can be provided in
support of these new protocols to Hotline operators, mandatory reporters, and others. As part of this
consideration, DPS will need to review this in detail and seek inputs from a range of professionals to
determine the answers and appropriate next steps.
Rationale: The CACD Hotline serves as the intake for mandatory reporters to report potential
abuse and neglect at the criminal (DPS) and civil (DHS) levels. Nearly half of these reports are
dismissed as not meeting the statutory definition of abuse or neglect. This result indicates there is
no legal basis for taking action or opening a case but does not mean that a child (and family) is not at
risk or in need of some other services.
Some of these dismissed calls may ultimately result in founded cases of abuse and neglect. Although
Arkansas DPS does not currently track this data, Casey Family Programs has reported that many of
these screen-out calls involve families that will be reported again to the hotline within 18 to 24
months. For example, in examining its hotline data, San Diego County found that it screened out
about half of hotline calls, but about half of those families involved in the screened-out calls were
reported again within 18 to 24 months.9 It is possible that many Arkansas calls that are screened out
9
Casey Family Programs Strategy Brief, “Transforming Child Welfare Systems, How does San Diego’s child
protection agency partner with 2-1-1 to better serve families and children?” September 2020, (20.07-QFF-TS-
San-Diego-211.pdf (casey.org).
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
will result in future investigations and open cases, which will represent risks to a child as well as
costly interventions for both the criminal justice and human services systems.
The existing CACD Hotline process is focused on engaging appropriate agencies once abuse or
neglect occurs and is not focused on prevention. The point of this initiative is to determine whether
a focus on prevention can appropriately be added, with required training, and whether giving
mandatory reporters and hotline operators the tools and training to direct families to community
resources may help reduce future reports of abuse and neglect, and potentially improve the well-
being of families.
If approved after consideration, this effort would entail training hotline operators and offering
training to mandatory reporters on the services available in the community and how to direct families
to these resources. For the mandatory reporters, this would likely require trauma-informed training.
Additionally, proceeding in this direction would include upgrading the existing SDM tool to support
hotline operators in sharing information with mandatory reporters about other available programs
when calls do not meet criteria for abuse or neglect. Hotline operators would ideally have the ability
to provide guidance that is geographically targeted and identified by need (e.g., housing, food,
clothing, substance abuse disorder prevention services, etc.). Operators would need training and
resources, including from other state guidance, DHS or the ADH about how to locate applicable
services and the process for making referrals.
If this initiative results in approved changes, DPS will consider tracking unfounded cases to
determine how frequently those reports ultimately lead to confirmed cases in the future. This will
help to inform future decision making about strategies to make the entire system prevention-
focused and help to calculate the overall positive impact of this initiative.
Implementation Considerations should this initiative result in approved
changes:
Training for mandatory reporters
DPS would need to determine the best path forward for offering training for mandated reporters. This
could involve coordinating with DHS and building a customized online training or working with one of
the existing social needs referral platforms that offer this training and customizing available training
to the use case of the hotline operator providing information to the mandatory reporter. The needs of
mandatory reporters are unique and training will need to address how to share resources in a
sensitive manner that increases the likelihood the family utilizes those services. DPS would need to
determine the extent and contents of required training based on professional advice.
Training for operators
The level of training necessary may vary, depending on the degree of changes made to the SDM tool.
The decision logic on when to provide referral information for community services would be built into
the tool to support staff through the determination. For example, if the report does not reach the level
of abuse or neglect, the SDM tool may be designed to direct the hotline operator to provide
information about applicable resources to the mandatory reporter (ideally geo-targeted to the
reporter’s location). The hotline operator could provide information for the most relevant resources
to the mandatory reporter and offer guidance on how to share this information with the family.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
In an alternative scenario, if DPS determines not to move forward with changes to the SDM tool, a
more manual process could be implemented. This would result in the need to train hotline operators
to find applicable resources. This could involve directing the family to Arkansas 211 or to a social
needs referral platform such as www.findhelp.org or developing a more customized listing of
resources grouped by category of need. Hotline operators would still have to coach mandatory
reporters through sharing this information with families in a culturally sensitive and trauma-informed
manner, which would also require training.
DPS would need to determine the extent and contents of required training based on professional
advice.
Enhancing the Structured Decision Making Tool
As noted above, one solution would be to modify the decision logic in the existing SDM tool to guide
the hotline operator in sharing relevant information with the mandatory reporter to assist the family
involved. One challenge is that someone – potentially DHS or Arkansas 211 – would have to curate
the list of services used by the hotline operators. As organizations change names, location, or
contact information, someone would need to be tasked with periodic review and update to the list to
ensure that mandatory reporters have accurate information to share with families. There are third-
party entities that track these changes with whom the state could contract.
Even if an upgrade did not include geo-targeting or the ability to sort by category of service, offering
statewide resources such as 211 could be a step forward and begin to shift the focus to prevention.
DPS would need to determine the required functionality of the tool based on professional advice.
Other State Case Studies:
Nebraska and New Hampshire
In 2023, Nebraska engaged in a statewide effort to transform its child welfare services, which
included focusing on community-based prevention in their Re-Imagine Child Well-Being initiative.10
One of the focus areas of this initiative was recommending changes to the child abuse and neglect
hotline.
In Nebraska, the Department of Health and Human Services, Division of Children and Family
Services (CFS) screens out on average over 20,000 calls a year. A Legislative Work Group Assessment
recommended designing an additional screening tool prioritizing calls with criteria that could
include, but not limited to factors such as: 11
• A primary caregiver under the age of twenty-six (26) years old;
• A child in the household under the age of three (3);
• A primary caregiver who is the legal guardian of minor(s) in the residence; and,
• A pregnant female.
Nebraska DHHS, “Reimagine Well-being,” Reimagine Well-being.
10
Legislative Work Group Report, “LB 1173 Child Welfare Practice Model,” LB 1173 Child Welfare Practice
11
Model (ne.gov).
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Regionally based community organizations would then provide the outreach and navigation services
to these families in order to offer education on available resources in their geographic region. The
navigator would connect the family by providing information or meeting directly with the family to
assist with navigating the referral to specific resources in the community.
The Legislative Work Group also reviewed similar models used in other states. For example, New
Hampshire launched a model in July 2023 where a community navigator receives a warm handoff
from the child welfare agency hotline operator and the navigator provides prompt outreach to the
families and offers resources to supportive services in their community. The process begins with the
navigator receiving the report from the state and making prompt contact with the family. Once
contact with the family is made, the navigator works on establishing rapport with the family and an
understanding about specific supports the family may benefit from. The navigator offers appropriate
community resources/referrals or other supportive services to the family based on their self-reported
need. Additionally, in this model, the vendor provides information to educate callers reporting from
their professional role, including but not limited to: local resources available to families; how the
resource operates and how a family can connect with the services; what the family can expect when
working with the community support service; skills and techniques of how to approach families to
offer support; techniques on how to engage with a family to get them to better connect with a service;
and information on the success of a warm handoff approach.
The Legislative Work Group recommended inclusion of this model in the Nebraska Child Welfare
Practice Model. The new Nebraska Child Welfare Practice Model now contains the following
language: “We will use alternative pathways, when appropriate, that are available to support families
to gain access to tools, resources, and services that can help them navigate life during challenging
times and reduce the number of unnecessary calls to the child welfare system hotline.”12
San Diego County
San Diego County operates a child abuse and neglect hotline much like DPS. Although screened-out
calls there did not warrant child welfare investigations, the families involved clearly had unmet
needs. As a result, San Diego created a partnership with 2-1-1 to address those needs, shifting its
hotline into a helpline, and training mandated reporters to be “mandated supporters.”13
San Diego County found that about half of the screened out calls involved families that were reported
again to the County Child Welfare Services (CWS) within the next two years, usually for child neglect.
However, CWS was not structured to offer prevention services to families with unsubstantiated
reports. The County’s Child and Family Strengthening Advisory Board and CWS leadership began to
explore a partnership with 2-1-1 San Diego, which already had information about more than 6,000
different types of services, including housing and utilities, health care, mental health, jobs and
financial aid, food and meals, childcare, senior care, transportation, and criminal justice.14
12
Legislative Work Group Report, “LB 1173 Child Welfare Practice Model,” LB 1173 Child Welfare Practice
Model (ne.gov).
13
Casey Family Programs Strategy Brief, “Transforming Child Welfare Systems, How does San Diego’s child
protection agency partner with 2-1-1 to better serve families and children?” Updated September 2020, 20.07-
QFF-TS-San-Diego-211.pdf (casey.org)
14
Casey Family Programs Strategy Brief, 2020.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
CWS and 2-1-1 offered new training for operators and then developed a Review, Assess, and Direct
(RAD) multidisciplinary team to review hotline reports for general neglect that meet the CWS criteria
for a five- or 10-day in-person response. Team members include hotline supervisors, emergency
response supervisors, social workers, public health nurses, and community partners. After reviewing
the reports, the RAD team determines whether to maintain the response, initiate a quicker response,
refer the report to 2-1-1, or evaluate out the report. RAD teams use a Structured Decision-Making
hotline screening tool that includes information about a family’s strengths and risks in making their
decisions. San Diego 2-1-1 trained navigation specialists to work specifically with families referred by
CWS or RAD teams. Navigation specialists are assigned to a specific team at 2-1-1 San Diego called
2-1-1 Connect. Once a week, the RAD teams send a list of families eligible for 2-1-1 services to the 2-
1-1 Connect staff. There are two opportunities for families to connect with 2-1-1 services: the hotline
can refer families directly to 2-1 1, or RAD teams can refer families reported for child neglect or with
risks for neglect but with reports that have been evaluated out.15 For families that do not reach out,
2-1-1 San Diego follows up the CWS letter with a branded flyer to the family with detailed information
about the services they can receive by being enrolled in 2-1-1 CONNECT.16
Additionally, San Diego County is now looking to train mandated reporters and others to call 2-1-1
instead of the hotline for cases that do not require immediate intervention (general neglect). CWS
leadership hopes that training mandated reporters — including teachers, medical professionals, and
law enforcement personnel — to call 2-1-1 as a prevention tool will result in helping families access
needed resources and reduce calls to the hotline. 17
Strategies to Address Potential Risks and Enable Success:
This initiative is to consider whether 1) additional protocols can be added to the Hotline for cases
that do not meet current thresholds for intervention, 2) additional training can be provided in support
of these new protocols to Hotline operators, mandatory reporters, and others. As part of this
consideration, DPS will need to seek inputs from a range of professionals to determine the answers
and appropriate next steps.
One potential risk to be reviewed as part of this consideration would be that implementing a greater
focus on prevention services could require resources without there being enough staff or time to
devote to this additional prevention focus within the abuse and neglect hotline. Resource and
referral technology, including referral to Arkansas 2-1-1 or free available social service platforms, like
www.findhelp.com, could be a way of mitigating future costs by lessening the burden of manual
having to identify resources.
Additionally, DHS and ADH programs and available community services may change frequently and
may be outdated or no longer available. To mitigate this issue, DPS would plan to make sure that
there is updated program and service availability for training and a mechanism to offer any updated
changes to programs and services available in real time.
15
Casey Family Programs Strategy Brief, 2020.
16
Casey Family Programs Strategy Brief, 2020.
17
Casey Family Programs Strategy Brief, 2020.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Steps to Implement Changes to Abuse and Neglect Hotline Process if DPS Determines to
Proceed with Changes following Consideration During this Initiative:
• Complete a study on the organizational structure and design of state child abuse hotline
functions.
• Conduct assessment of call center SDM safety assessment tool/identify areas within the
current call center process, especially related to screen out calls, that could allow for more
effective prevention focus.
• Design future state process to include technology services and integration into current state
process to allow call center staff to provide appropriate social service referrals information
to mandated reporters or families in need.
• Review call center data to determine types of and percent of calls that are screened out and
in what location of state to determine areas to focus either through future mandated reporter
outreach/training or call center social service referral technology improvements and
upgrades.
• Identify call center training needs that can be upgraded that identify DHS and DOH prevention
programs and services and how families can access same in any Arkansas county.
• Identify and develop plan for mandatory caller training to include collaboration with DHS.
• Consult with District Attorneys prior to implementing new reporter training.
• Issue any RFP for new technology services that connect families in need to services or allow
call center staff to connect within their systems to appropriate referral information.
Alternatively, develop partnership with Arkansas 211.
• Go live with process improvement changes related to more front-end prevention focus – work
with DHS and DOH to include staff and leadership and roll out changes to community.
• Track and monitor for future outcomes.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative is
directly aligned with the Governor’s priority of placing the focus on prevention. If this initiative
determines that changes are advisable, they may help reduce the incidences of future child abuse
and neglect. There would be a cost for training for mandatory reporters and hotline operators, as
well as a cost to update the SDM.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
Depending on any DPS determination to upgrade the SDM tool, DPS will either need to provide
training to hotline operators to continue the process even if there is no identified statutory abuse and
neglect and either read from the screen to the mandatory reporter or look through other materials to
offer assistance to families. DPS would also add this to new hire orientation. All this would need to
be done on the basis of professional advice.
In addition, there would need to be changes to mandatory reporter training to add the sharing of
community resources to the family of the reported child.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation if determined
by this initiative:
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Percent of Screened-In Calls with Prior Screened-Out Finding (expected to decrease);
• Percent of Screened-Out Calls (expected to decrease);
• Total calls to the Hotline (expected to decrease); and,
• Confirmed cases of abuse and neglect (expected to decrease).
Note that the first metric is not captured today.
Identification and estimation of any savings that could be realized if the
initiative results in a determination to change the approach: While the intended
primary benefit would be better support of children and families and reduced risk, there may also be
a savings impact. If the initiative results in prevention of issues such that there is a 10% reduction in
future cases requiring intervention, that would reflect an approximate savings to the State of
Arkansas of over $2 million dollars annually. This would include the time and resource cost for
investigations assigned as well as for the resulting services for founded cases. During the work on
this initiative, these assumptions should all be tested on the basis of professional advice.
In its most recent quarterly report, DPS CACD received 15,861 reports of potential abuse and
neglect, of which 49% were screened out at the time of the call.
Change Management Plan: It is too early at this stage to outline a change management plan
because the initiative has not yet determined, on the basis of professional advice, whether to
proceed with changes. Part of the initiative will be to develop the change management plan for any
agreed changes.
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DPS Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Strategic Management Plan:
Arkansas Department of
Energy & Environment
Table of Contents
Overview ...........................................................................................................................................1
Recommended Organizational Structure .......................................................................................2
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation .................................................. 5
E&E-01: Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and efficiency .............................. 5
E&E-03: Identify and Prioritize SEEK Improvements .............................................................................. 5
E&E-04: Reskill and upskill E&E employees .......................................................................................... 9
E&E-05: Redesign internal processes around reviewing and tracking grant allocation in E&E ....... 16
E&E-06: Improve E&E data transparency .............................................................................................. 23
E&E-07: Develop and institute more concise enforcement templates .............................................. 27
E&E-12: Improve Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) permitting process and review.................... 33
Overview
The Arkansas Department of Energy & Environment (E&E) advances responsible management of
energy resources and protection of Arkansas’ environment, through the work of two primary
divisions:
• Division of Energy & Mineral Resources, which promotes sustainable, orderly, and
environmentally sound development of energy and mineral resources. This division houses
the Arkansas Energy Office, the Office of Mining, the Office of the State Geologist, Emergency
Management, the Liquefied Petroleum Gas Board, and the Oil & Gas Commission.
• Division of Environmental Quality, which advances the quality of Arkansas’ environment
and economy through the protection of air, land, and water resources.
Administratively attached to E&E, the Pollution Control and Ecology Commission (PC&EC). The
Commission includes seven members, three representing state agencies and four appointed by the
Governor.
Through the Arkansas Forward project, a 2024 initiative to improve the efficiency and effectiveness
of Arkansas’ 15 cabinet-level departments, E&E prioritized implementation of seven initiatives
1
E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
including five focused on improving its processes to improve staff and stakeholder experience and
two that invest in the staff and organization at E&E to help the organization deliver on its mission.
This Strategic Management Plan (“Plan”) memorializes the work completed by E&E during Arkansas
Forward, translating the department’s vision into a plan consisting of recommended organizational
structure, key initiatives prioritized for immediate implementation, and related performance metrics.
A companion project plan (“Work Plan”) provides a more detailed resource to support
implementation of the initiatives by E&E’s Arkansas Forward project management team.
Recommended Organizational Structure
E&E’s current organization chart is shown in Figure 1.
2
E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 1 – Current Organizational Structure
Note: Three organization layers are shown for each division under the Secretary of Energy & Environment (chart
is not inclusive of all staff).
As part of Arkansas Forward, E&E’s structure was reviewed to identify opportunities for redesign in
three areas:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission;
3
E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives; and,
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions (i.e.,
information technology, human resources, procurement).
As part of Arkansas Forward, E&E undertook a review of each division’s organization to identify
opportunities to create a more agile organization, considering span of control, number of managerial
layers, opportunities for internal shared services consolidation, and repurposing of existing
positions, among other factors. E&E evaluated:
• Changes that would support the department’s execution of its mission: No additional
changes were identified.
• Changes identified through implementation of Arkansas Forward initiatives: No
additional changes were identified.
• Changes necessitated by Arkansas’ centralization of certain shared services functions:
Based on direction from the Steering Committee, Transformation and Shared Services (TSS)
will assume responsibility for the Payroll and Help Desk functions statewide, as the first
Human Resources and Information Technology functions to transfer to TSS in a statewide
shared services model. Additional decisions on sequencing of further functions have not yet
been determined.
After evaluating the current organizational structure, E&E determined to continue operations with
the current structure shown in Figure 1.
How this Department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective
future department
E&E desires to eliminate mostly paper-based, manual processes. The timing is ideal for E&E to
improve effectiveness and efficiency. A primary example is greater automation through the
implementation of the SEEK system for DEQ programs. E&E selected a vendor who has assisted eight
other states with the successful transition to automating processes including digital signatures,
automated workflow that provides alerts and allows users to view status, input and validation
controls that force users to enter accurate and complete information, and improved data analytics
through better quality reporting. Internal staff and E&E customers will benefit greatly from this
automation as SEEK will make processes more efficient and effective. E&E is using a phased
implementation approach to implement this solution to remain within appropriations and existing
resources. In addition, E&E has an opportunity to invest in its staff through reskilling and upskilling,
which will support achievement of improved efficiency and effectiveness.
4
E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward
Implementation
E&E leadership generated nearly ten ideas to improve departmental effectiveness and efficiency,
before prioritizing seven initiatives for immediate implementation as part of Arkansas Forward. These
initiatives collectively focus on improving the organization.
E&E-01: Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and
efficiency
This initiative is part of the broader Arkansas Forward Agile Organization initiative and includes
implementing a tailored and modernized organization to ensure effective distribution of
management responsibilities, enhanced operational efficiency, and improved role clarity among
managerial positions.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Through this initiative, the project team facilitated
discussion with each division leader to identify opportunities to create a more agile organization.
Multiple factors were considered including span of control, managerial layers, opportunity for further
shared services consolidation. In this review, a small number of opportunities were identified where
span of control for a given leader was small, and there was an opportunity to remove or flatten a layer
of the organization to improve communication flow and decision-making. When reviewing these
instances, the anticipated organizational gain achieved did not outweigh the risk of making the
organizational chart change.
Rationale: As part of Initiative EE-01, to create the most agile and efficient organization, E&E
leadership and human resources staff reviewed the organization structure and determined no
changes are needed at this time.
Implementation Considerations: Not applicable.
E&E-03: Identify and Prioritize SEEK Improvements
This initiative directs the Arkansas Department of Energy & Environment (E&E) to identify and
prioritize the top two to three potential obstacles to SEEK (data management system) efficacy and
implement mitigation strategies to minimize the impact.
Initiative Overview and Current State: SEEK is the new data management system for E&E –
Division of Environment Quality (DEQ) and supports the following DEQ programs:
• Asbestos
• Construction stormwater
• Industrial stormwater
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E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Regulated storage tanks
The primary functionality offered by SEEK includes online bill payments, guided document
submissions, and dashboards that organize reports and applications. SEEK has implemented two
new automated features recently including paperless annual invoicing and instant online electronic
signature approval.
The SEEK software is being developed using a phased approach by a vendor (Windsor Solutions).
SEEK implementation includes the following phases:
• Phase 1 has been implemented and the anecdotal response from users has been very
positive. There are four Phase 1 permit types currently implemented in SEEK. These permit
types were chosen for their high volume and includes: Construction Storm Water General
Permit (CGP) for the Office of Water Quality, Regulated Storage Tanks (RST) for the Office of
Land Resources, and Asbestos for the Office of Air Quality. External users are able to submit
initial permit applications and DEQ staff are able to complete their review and issue permits
within SEEK. Additionally, the Office of Water Quality has independently added the permit
application process for Industrial Storm Water General Permit (IGP) to SEEK.
• Phase 2 focused on eliminating duplicative and paper-based data entry will significantly
shorten the amount of time needed to develop inspection reports. DEQ is currently building
/ testing models for each type of inspection for the initial permitting regimes.
• Phase 3 spans the October 2024 through June 2025 timeframe and includes DEQ - wide
general permit applications as well as DEQ-wide nSPECT (the inspection module) build and
implementation.
• Phase 4 is planned for July 2025 through March 2026 and includes DEQ-wide Individual
permit applications.
• Phase 5, planned for April 2026 through December 2026, will allow for the clean-up of any
outstanding items from the prior phases and wrapping up the project to be substantially
complete.
E&E is pleased with the work completed to-date. Windsor Solutions has successfully implemented
this software in several other states, including Alabama, South Carolina, Oklahoma, Michigan,
Hawaii, and Wyoming. E&E staff can contact their counterparts in other states to ask questions and
gather information. There has yet to be a formal user group established with the different states, but
that may be something they do in the future so that there is a regular forum for meeting and sharing
information with other states.
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Rationale: E&E intends to modernize DEQ processes using software tools that will ultimately
reduce staff workload as well as provide efficiencies to users who will be able to use online tools to
replace the current laborious paper-based processes. Windsor Solutions, the SEEK vendor, has
assisted eight other states in successfully implementing online capabilities to serve constituents in
their respective states. Building on their successful track record, Windsor Solutions was selected to
provide SEEK software for Arkansas. E&E has a good working relationship with this vendor and feels
that they benefit from their experience with successful implementations in other states. The SEEK
project was already underway prior to Arkansas Forward, but this initiative was identified to assist
the project team by identifying and addressing obstacles to SEEK implementation.
Implementation Considerations:
Steps to expedite SEEK implementation:
• Conduct a thorough current-state analysis of SEEK's functionality. Inventory what E&E
agency functions could be improved through using SEEK. Prioritize and map out the SEEK
implementation plan to roll out functions over time. (Complete).
• Develop a plan to address the top two to three prioritized obstacles, including specific
processes and timelines for implementation. (Complete).
• Assign owners to each process and ensure they have the necessary resources to carry out their
responsibilities.
• Monitor progress regularly and adjust the plan as needed to ensure timely and effective
implementation.
• Communicate updates and progress to all relevant stakeholders, including department
leadership and SEEK users.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The success of
this initiative will be measured by the implementation and phased roll-out of SEEK system’s full
functionality. E&E could consider the following performance measures:
• Percentage of days the SEEK rollout is on track to reach target milestones;
• Number of high-priority SEEK functionalities that are implemented; and,
• Percentage improvement in E&E performance metrics once SEEK is fully deployed (e.g.,
significant reduction in number of days to issue a permit, develop an inspection report, etc.)
In addition to performance measures, E&E could consider measuring intangible goals (e.g.,
improving internal and external stakeholder satisfaction). E&E could potentially measure improved
satisfaction through:
• Post-deployment survey of external user satisfaction;
• Post-deployment survey of internal users on satisfaction with the improved SEEK capabilities;
and
• Citizen focus groups to gather information on user likes/dislikes and use of this information to
improve the SEAK system.
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Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: Over time, the implementation of SEEK functionality will allow users to
complete manual tasks online and significantly improve the efficiency of operations. While there is
no perfect way to quantify the savings that should result from these improvements, E&E could
consider a user satisfaction survey once SEEK has been fully implemented. Already E&E has received
anecdotal feedback from users that they are pleased with the initial phase implementation of
paperless invoicing and electronic signatures. E&E could consider deploying an online survey that
could capture customer satisfaction with the additional functionality as it is rolled out.
Change Management Plan: E&E should consider some messaging to customers discussing
the longer turnaround times and letting them know that online improvements will be coming soon.
E&E could use the communication plan in Figure 2 to socialize SEEK messaging to internal and
external stakeholders.
Figure 2 – E&E-03 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Internal E&E staff In the process • Intranet/email E&E Leadership
messages to
staff
• Townhall
meetings
External E&E SEEK project updates that describe • Banner E&E
stakeholders current capabilities and touts message on Communications to
upcoming implementations the E&E develop content for
website Leadership
• Social media approval
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E&E-04: Reskill and upskill E&E employees
This initiative seeks to expand E&E cross-training to 1) support business continuity for critical tasks
and reduce instances of delay or work stoppages when staff are out of office or at capacity and 2)
provide motivated employees with opportunities to build their skill set and advance in their careers
at E&E.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Department has two major divisions: Division of
Energy and Mineral Resources and DEQ. In performing these functions, the department employs a
variety of specialized professional positions such as scientists, engineers, geologists, and
epidemiologists. Additional professionals include inspectors (e.g., air and water quality) and compliance
analysts that focus on enforcement.
Some of the workforce challenges E&E experiences today include:
• Turnover, including high turnover with some of the inspector positions. Causes include higher
pay rates offered by private organizations or employees going to a different area within
Arkansas state government. In 2023, the turnover rate was 18.9%, though this is lower for
2024 year-to-date (8.7% across the entire department).
• Hiring qualified replacements can be a challenge due to availability and/or pay rate.
• The current pay scale does not compensate for education or experience or as a
reward/promotion mechanism with a job family.
• Turmoil (movement within the organization) occurs periodically within certain functions,
such as the inspector roles. In 2023, the turmoil rate was 2.3%; Year-to-date 2024, the rate of
turmoil is low (0.3%), but when this occurs, it can be a challenge for the impacted managers.
• Competing priorities across divisions can be a challenge.
• Business continuity challenges can arise when employees leave. This becomes worse when
the job is very specialized.
E&E leadership has identified an opportunity to identify professional support and administrative staff
who can be cross trained for mission critical and essential business functions to maintain business
continuity. Some potential options include:
• Specialized positions: Specialists can be low in number or harder to replace, putting strain
on existing resources when they leave, potentially causing business continuity issues.
Specialists are generally very busy with their work that tends to be technical in nature. It is
difficult to fill these roles and cover these responsibilities when a specialist leaves.
• Inspector positions: If one type of inspector is cross-trained to do the investigation and
sampling of another type of inspector, and the cross-trained inspector was already in the
inspection vicinity, it would increase efficiency to conduct the work while the inspector is
nearby. This will improve response time and reduce the overall amount of inspection time as
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well as reducing travel expense. The type of inspections across groups will dictate the
feasibility of this recommendation.
• Staff who support specialists: There are ways to expand the training of staff who support
specialists, to maximize their available time. For example: supporting staff could be trained
to identify and remediate problems not needing the inspector’s expertise, supporting staff
could assist with permitting, and they could be trained to identify suspicious activity and
collect documentation.
• Augment Small Teams: Functional areas with few resources could be good candidates for
additional staff support such as more support for hazardous waste and enforcement analyst
teams.
Rationale: Cross-training has been used effectively by many government organizations. This
initiative recommends that E&E pursue cross-training opportunities for the multiple potential
benefits it can provide. Training and development of staff can help employees learn or strengthen
skills, and increase confidence, motivation and productivity. Training and mentoring help create a
better understanding of work expectations and an appreciation of the value of the employee’s
contributions. Cross-training best practice adoption can provide quality and service level
improvements. Cross-training can provide efficiency improvement if done correctly, but also makes
the job more interesting, makes the employee feel more valued, and enables employee learning and
career development. By encouraging a learning / cross-training culture, E&E ensures that employees
take a more active role in their work and help to spread knowledge and best practices throughout
their organization. These factors can support a more engaged and satisfied workforce, which can
improve retention and create a more effective organization overall.
Implementation Considerations:
There are a number of Cross-training Best Practices for E&E’s consideration, including:
1. Job rotation programs
• Description: Employees rotate through different roles or departments to gain a broad
understanding of the organization.
• Benefits: Increases employee engagement and develops a well-rounded skill set.
2. Mentorship programs
• Description: Pairing employees with mentors from different departments or roles to provide
guidance and knowledge.
• Benefits: Facilitates knowledge transfer and provides personalized learning experiences.
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3. Shadowing programs
• Description: Employees follow and observe colleagues in different roles to learn about their
responsibilities and daily tasks.
• Benefits: Provides practical, hands-on experience and insights into other roles.
4. Online learning platforms
• Description: Using e-learning platforms that offer a variety of courses and modules across
different functions and skill areas.
• Benefits: Flexible, scalable, and can be tailored to individual needs.
5. Cross Functional Teams
• Description: Forming teams with members from different departments to work on specific
projects or initiatives.
• Benefits: Encourages collaboration and knowledge sharing across different areas of the
organization.
6. Workshops and training sessions
• Description: Regularly scheduled workshops or training sessions focusing on skills and
knowledge applicable to multiple roles.
• Benefits: Provides structured learning and can be tailored to current organizational needs.
7. Internal talent pools
• Description: Identifying and developing internal talent for various roles within the
organization.
• Benefits: Encourages career development and helps in filling roles with skilled internal
candidates.
Implementing a combination of these approaches can create a comprehensive cross-training
program that meets the diverse needs of E&E’s workforce.
Considerations for Successful Implementation:
Based on E&E interviews, focus group and best practice research, there are several considerations
for a successful implementation:
• Cross-training Capability / Capacity: It is expected E&E will have the internal capability and
capacity to conduct the cross-training. The areas and type of staff identified will determine
the additional training required. However, the program will require participation by
leadership, management and staff to develop the program, understand the program and
operate the program, so consideration for this extra level of work is needed.
• Recognition and Rewards: It is important to recognize and reward staff that are cross-trained.
It will also be critical for E&E to obtain input from staff, and support from leadership, to
develop an effective recognition program.
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• Program Guide Development: For the areas selected for cross-training, E&E should develop
an agency program guide that describes the duties of the different divisions and job types
involved in supporting each functional area. The guide should be used as part of agency
cross-training curriculum.
• Levels of Cross-training: Cross-training has the potential to improve employee development
and enhance productivity in an organization. Each functional area will need to evaluate which
jobs are feasible and beneficial for cross-training, and which ones are not. Cross-training
should focus on developing higher level understanding and basic task knowledge of other
jobs to enable the cross-trained staff to conduct some of the basic duties of other staff jobs.
The level of training and knowledge will need to be determined by each functional area, but
the objective is to help cross-trained staff manage some of the workload for other areas to
improve efficiency.
• Who to Cross Train: It is critical for leadership to identify groups and types of positions that
are good cross-training candidates. Leadership should begin with defining the criteria to use
to select groups/roles for cross-training and have division leaders use the criteria to identify
the candidates. Cross-training provides potential benefit to various groups, but due to inherit
differences in the groups and positions, not all groups/positions are good candidates for this
program.
Overall strategies for successful implementation of this initiative include:
• Ensure proper communication and messaging is delivered to all appropriate stakeholders
and staff to ensure relevant groups and employees are aware, involved and committed to the
cross-training program.
• Assign dedicated staff to collaborate among groups and oversee the development and
effectiveness of the program.
• Conduct regular feedback sessions to understand and address any concerns, offer incentives for
participation, and ensure cross-training is aligned with employee career aspirations.
• Development of the cross-training program will require additional time and effort from
existing management and staff. Management should monitor normal operational workloads
to help ensure quality levels are met and existing operations are not negatively affected by
new program work efforts.
Based on these best practices and implementation considerations, the recommended action steps
for implementation of this initiative include:
• Partner with division leaders to identify E&E staff who perform mission-critical work. Determine
whether their workload is seasonal with high/low periods.
• For each staff who are identified as performing mission critical work, E&E should select and
designate a back-up for that person. The back-up should be thoroughly cross-trained and able
to take over to maintain business continuity if the person leaves/is unable to execute job
responsibilities
• Inform identified staff that they have been selected for the cross-training program. Frame the
program as an opportunity for staff to receive extra support during their busy periods.
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• Design a rewards / recognition / performance system to encourage staff to cross-train (e.g.,
a badge on their profile, breakfast with the Secretary or a personalized email from the
Secretary, other incentives). Add cross-training to the employee job description and include
it in year-end evaluation.
• Design a standard cross-training guide that can apply across roles, agnostic of the nature of
work. (Please note: As mentioned earlier in this document, there will likely be a need to
customize the guides for different functional areas and job types.)
• Partner with division leaders to identify employees who might be interested in cross-training
for another role. Good candidates include high performing employees who are interested in
cross-skilling in another area. Candidates could also be recruited from the Leadership
Enhancement and Engagement Program (LEEP), an E&E leadership development program.
Reference the retired “colleague on assignment” program for inspiration.
• Inform / invite identified employees to the cross-training program and ask for their formal
commitment.
• Match employees who opt-in to the program with cross-training opportunities.
• Hold training sessions for employees and their cross-training trainees to review the guide and
discuss their respective roles and responsibilities, how often they should be interacting, target
outcomes, etc.
Project team formation and project execution perspective (high level example):
• Verify / identify internal group leadership and operational leads to lead and participate in the
program.
• Engage the internal project management organization for support and assign a project
manager. (Execute day-to-day project related activities following internal project
management / change management organization policies and procedures.)
• Determine stakeholders to be included for support, approval, reporting and communication
purposes, and identify necessary key project participants.
• Work with the project manager, management, staff participants, and select stakeholders to:
o review initial project documentation (charter, strategic management plan, meeting
notes, etc.) and revisit current environment and target environment expectations;
o identify the right groups and types of positions that can be cross-trained and upskilled;
o gather feedback from employees and managers to identify areas for improvement and
ensure the program will meet these needs;
o and determine the overall high-level approach / plan including high level requirements,
milestones, tasks, risks, issues, schedule, participants and responsibilities,
communications plan, status reporting structure.
• Project manager conducts the official kick-off meeting with the broader audience including
stakeholders and project participants to review the project scope, objectives, current
environment, target environment, benefits, challenges, initial project plan, etc.
• Project manager starts weekly core team status meetings, bi-weekly / monthly leadership status
reporting / meetings, and working group sessions to develop and execute a detailed project plan
by division and functional area.
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Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Staff will need to
participate and take on extra work to support this effort, so staff availability / workload analysis will
be needed to plan and execute this initiative accordingly. Providing consideration for staff peak
workload times and other high priority work will require a balanced effort to avoid extremes in
overtime, employee dissatisfaction, and negative affects to other high priority work not part of this
initiative.
Estimation of department priorities with staffing and resources: E&E leadership
anticipates that existing human resources staff would coordinate this new program. Human
resources must consider that functional areas may have unique staffing challenges that may
necessitate a tailoring the implementation approach to meet the unique needs of the different
divisions/groups.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
E&E will need to adjust staff training and development processes to accommodate the new program.
New cross-training curriculum will need to be developed. Also, recruiting / hiring areas may need to
update their marketing, communication and messaging processes. Recognition of staff for cross-
training and performance improvement accomplishments may require updates / changes to present
staff recognition processes.
The cross-training program will need to address any process and procedure changes related to job
level / description changes as well as potential cross-training related incentive compensation
(including benefits, bonuses, or salary).
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: Proposed metrics to
assess the impact of this initiative include:
• Employee satisfaction rate (expected to increase);
• Employee retention rates (expected to increase); and,
• Number of “work stoppage” delays in critical areas (expected to decrease).
Overall impacts of this initiative are expected to be increased satisfaction and retention of
employees, reduced “work stoppage” delays, and peak workload periods being managed more
efficiently by cross-trained staff.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: This initiative is not expected to result in direct cost savings and cost
avoidance opportunities in this fiscal year, but such benefits could be realized in the future including
reduced costs related to overtime; reduced costs related to staff turnover; and reduced costs due to
operational productivity enhancement through training, retention, and quality improvements. If
deemed feasible, a reward or incentive compensation to cross-trained staff would involve some
additional cost requiring cost / benefit analysis to determine the best method.
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Change Management Plan: Once E&E defines the jobs that are included in the cross-training
program, the communications team should consider the general stakeholders, groups and functional
areas impacted by the cross-training program for their communication approach. Messaging will be
important as division leaders identify staff that could be cross-trained. Ensure proper communication
and messaging is delivered to all appropriate stakeholders and staff to ensure all relevant groups and
employees are aware, involved and committed to the cross-training program. The message should likely
be different for employees who have applicable jobs versus employees whose jobs do not qualify for
cross-training at this time. Clear communication with leadership and staff about the purpose for the
changes should accompany any information on the new process changes. Recommended messaging and
modalities are included for each audience in the table below.
Key activities and timing for the communication plan will be included in Attachment A – E&E Work
Plan and are summarized in Figure 3 below.
Figure 3 - E&E-04 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Staff impacted by • E&E is adding new cross - • Town hall. • Department head or
changes training benefits for select job • Face-to-Face impacted division leads
types as part of Arkansas team meetings • Communication
Forward. We are investing in with leadership Director
our organization as a strategy • Email • Internal
to better manage our • Website Communications
operations, help us better resource
serve our citizens and increase
opportunities for employee
personal satisfaction and
growth.
• Detailed description of
changes, including specific
changes for every area
impacted by the new
program.
Other staff • High level summary of changes • Town hall • Department head or
Other groups including why only some • Face-to-face impacted division leads
positions are included. meetings with • Communication
leadership Director
• All staff email • Internal
• Website Communications
resource
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E&E-05: Redesign internal processes around reviewing and tracking grant
allocation
This initiative seeks to redesign internal processes around reviewing and tracking grant allocation in
E&E, with the goal of reducing time employees spend on unnecessary review and information
requests.
Initiative Overview and Current State: E&E’s grant management operations have faced
significant challenges. From late April until June 2024, the organization was unable to draw federal
funds, and by the end of July, the three staff members who had the necessary expertise left the team.
Prior to their departure, there was no standardized method for logging new grants or establishing a
coherent structure to track and oversee grants. Multiple grant tracking workbooks were in use, but
they were incomplete and inconsistent with one another. As a result, there are discrepancies
between incurred expenses and grant filings. For example, some of the tracking logs have “end
dates” that passed six months ago, yet extensions were never logged. Additionally, there were
instances where personnel expenses were not obligated to grants, but upon review, it was
discovered that costs had already been expended.
The reliance on spreadsheets and manual processes has hindered efficiency, highlighting the need
for improved automation in grant management. Fiscal personnel understand their roles, but they do
not fully understand the fiscal requirements for grant management. A Request for Proposal (RFP) is
currently being issued to enhance the technology framework for managing grants, programs, and
financial matters for certain programs. While a manual process is in place, an improved process,
supported by an automated tool that facilitates tighter controls is essential to ensure accountability
and accurately track incurred versus projected spending. An improved tool would facilitate improved
communication and management of subgrantees, as well as enforcing process consistency.
Although communication during the payment process is improving, it remains a weak link, resulting
in slow invoice processing. Overall, the organization requires a comprehensive overhaul of its grant
management process to ensure efficiency and compliance moving forward.
Rationale: The initiative to modernize the grants management system is designed to transform the
way the department manages its grant processes, ultimately leading to improved efficiency and
effectiveness. The plan begins with replacing the current system with an automated tool that
incorporates automated workflows and digital signatures, significantly streamlining the grant
application and approval process. Once the grant has been approved, the automated tool will enable
E&E to accurately track, monitor, and report on grant expenditures and provide needed
documentation/support in the event of an audit. Standardizing grant management processes,
supported by the use of an automated tool, will bring consistency and efficiency to the entire grant
management lifecycle from beginning to end.
Identifying best practices and automated tools used by other agencies, will help E&E improve their
own grant management process. Automating key aspects of grant reporting will reduce manual
workloads, allowing staff to focus on strategic tasks while increasing the accuracy of reporting.
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Furthermore, providing key personnel with view/read-only access to critical data will improve
transparency and collaboration among teams.
To increase fairness in funding distribution, the initiative will also aim to optimize the current
indirect cost calculation. Lastly, adding a reconciliation process between Time & Effort data and
payroll data will ensure that both records are accurate and consistent, minimizing discrepancies
and enhancing overall accountability.
Overall, this initiative will modernize and streamline grant management, ultimately resulting in
improved accuracy, efficiency, and resource allocation within the department, enabling it to more
effectively achieve its objectives and serve its stakeholders.
During the work session, the team constructed a strategic compass diagram (shown in Figure 4) as
part of the work on this initiative. This diagram has multiple purposes including to help E&E establish
focus on the goals of the grants process, to identify the major milestone steps in the process, and to
identify bottlenecks. Finally, the team identified what “good” looks like and identifying the barriers
to achieving “good.”
Figure 4 – E&E-05 Strategic Compass Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with E&E staff held on August 29, 2024.
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Figure 5 provides a process map that illustrates the current grant management process. The
map shows the responsibilities of different parties. The process changes slightly, as does the
timing, based on the type of grant and the federal requirements for reporting. The map is an
accurate representation of how work flows through the grants management system.
Figure 5 – E&E-05 Grant Allocation Current State Map
Source: Developed in work session with E&E staff held on August 29, 2024.
Implementation Considerations:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
E&E must carefully consider legal compliance for funding requirements when redesigning the
grants process. E&E should provide legal support and active participation to ensure that the
redesigned processes comply with all relevant laws and regulations. A second potential risk is that
the redesigned process would result in data inaccuracy issues. E&E should implement rigorous
data validation processes to ensure migrated data is the most up-to-date available, and the
automated tool should apply consistent data validations and balancing.
In preparing to implement this initiative, E&E identified potential challenges/barriers to improve the
grant management process in a facilitated work session, the results of which are shown in the
diagram presented in Figure 6. In this diagram, the goal to improve the grant process is summarized
in the blue box; the potential challenges the team may experience are shown in red boxes, and the
related solutions are shown in green.
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Figure 6 – E&E 05 Interference Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with E&E staff held on August 29, 2024.
Recommended Steps for Establishing the Future State:
The steps below were identified by the team as critical to achieving long-term success in the
initiative. The list below details the context of each step and provides a status as to the progress.
1. Process Analysis (Complete)
Conduct a thorough analysis of existing grant allocation processes.
2. Role Definition (In Progress)
Define and document specific roles and responsibilities for staff who participate in the grant
management process.
3. Process Optimization (In Progress)
Streamline the grant allocation process by removing redundant steps.
4. Process Documentation (Not Started)
Create a detailed process document outlining the redesigned grant allocation process.
Include a process map that shows the roles and responsibilities of the participants.
5. Transition Plan (Not started)
Develop a transition plan for implementation of the new process, including planning for
procurement of an automated workflow tool.
6. Stakeholder Communication (Not Started)
Effectively communicate the changes in the grant allocation process and the transition plan
for implementing the new process to all relevant stakeholders.
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7. Process Evaluation (Not Started)
Regularly monitor and evaluate the performance of the redesigned process.
8. Dashboard Implementation (Not Started)
Assess the potential to leverage dashboard tools to visualize grant allocation data.
9. Continuous Improvement (Not Started)
Establish mechanisms to continuously gather feedback and regularly review and update the
process.
Alignment of Department priorities with staffing and resources
The Finance department is currently grappling with resource challenges stemming from the recent
loss of three key staff members. While new hires have been brought on board to fill these vacancies,
the department is still working to recover lost ground and regain its previous level of efficiency. The
new Chief Financial Officer (CFO) is fully aware of these challenges and is dedicated to ensuring that
her team not only recovers but also surpasses its previous performance. Grant management, a
primary funding source for many programs and media within the department, has been identified as
a high priority area for leadership. Overcoming these staffing shortages and integrating new staff
while maintaining a focus on grant management will be crucial for the department's success in
supporting the initiative's goals.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans:
Some of these process changes may not alter the fundamental steps involved in grant management
but rather may significantly impact how those steps are executed. By embracing digital tools,
standardizing procedures, and benchmarking against best practices, the agency can enhance
efficiency, reduce errors, and improve overall grant management outcomes. Additionally, training
around key steps may simply mean a given step is executed correctly the first time a higher
percentage of the time, while cross-training will mean that resiliency is added to the process.
Modernization of the grants management system is a significant step towards streamlining the
process. By leveraging automated workflow and digital signatures, the system can reduce manual
tasks, minimize errors, and expedite the approval process.
Formalizing and vetting the grant management process ensures consistency and adherence to
best practices. This involves creating clear guidelines and procedures for each step of the process,
from application submission to award disbursement and grant fund expenditure reporting.
Benchmarking against other agencies provides valuable insights into industry standards and best
practices. By comparing the agency’s processes to those of others, areas for improvement can be
identified and addressed.
Automating key aspects of grant reporting reduces the administrative burden and improves
accuracy. By automating data collection and analysis and grant fund expenditure tracking, staff can
focus on more strategic tasks and ensure that reports are timely and reliable.
Providing key staff with view/read-only access to needed data enhances transparency and
collaboration. By granting access to relevant information, staff can make informed decisions and
work together more effectively.
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Reexamining the current indirect cost calculation ensures that costs are allocated fairly and
accurately. By reviewing the calculation and making necessary adjustments, the agency can
optimize its resource allocation and improve cost management.
Adding reconciliation between Time & Effort data and payroll data improves accuracy and
consistency. By reconciling these two data sets, the agency can identify and correct errors, ensuring
that payroll is processed accurately.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The proposed performance metrics for the initiative aim to evaluate its effectiveness in modernizing
and streamlining the grants management process. These metrics will provide quantifiable measures
of success, enabling the department to track improvements and identify areas for further
enhancement. Key performance metrics include:
1. Decrease in Total Time Spent Communicating, Reviewing, and Pulling Data for Grant
Allocations and Available Funding: This metric will measure the reduction in hours dedicated
to communication and administrative tasks related to grant management. A decrease will
indicate improved efficiency due to streamlined processes and automated workflows.
2. Improved Decision Making and Speed of Grant Funding Allocation Driven by Clearer, Real-
Time Funding Data: This will assess how quickly and effectively the department can make
funding decisions based on real-time access to funding data. Improved speed and quality of
decision-making will reflect the positive impact of enhanced transparency and automated
reporting.
3. Improved Ability to Tie Grant Allocations Back to Sources of Funding (i.e., Fiscal and
Budgetary Appropriations): This metric will evaluate the department's effectiveness in linking
grant allocations to their respective funding sources. Enhanced clarity in this area will
support accountability and better financial planning.
4. Reduction in Manual Workload Associated with Grant Reporting: By automating reporting
functions, the department can measure the decrease in time staff spend on manual reporting
tasks, and result in more accurate reporting.
5. Increased User Satisfaction with the Grants Management System: Surveys can be conducted
to gauge user satisfaction with the new digital platform, measuring factors such as usability,
accessibility, and overall experience in managing grants.
6. Accuracy of Grant Reporting: This metric will assess the frequency of errors in grant reports
before and after implementation. A decrease in errors will indicate improved accuracy due to
automated processes.
7. Timeliness of Grant Funding Allocation: Tracking the time taken from grant application
submission to funding allocation will assess improvements in speed and efficiency within the
process.
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8. Engagement and Training Participation Rates for Key Staff: Monitoring the number of staff
members trained on the new system and their engagement levels will provide insights into
the initiative's adoption and user readiness.
By implementing these performance metrics, the department will be able to evaluate the success of
the initiative, ensuring it meets its objectives of enhancing efficiency, transparency, and
accountability in grant management.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented:
There is potential for savings from the implementation of a grants management system to help
manage grants and coordinate between program areas and Finance. In one program area, it was
estimated that a week would be shaved from each of the six steps in the Funding Approval Request
process.
Implementing an improved grant management data repository will enable efficient retrieval of grant
information and significantly reduce the amount of time staff currently spend searching for
information. While each information request requires only a couple of hours of staff time to respond,
having all data in one repository and having immediate digital access to that information would
reduce that effort to only a few moments. Using staff's assumption of two hours for the typical
response to a current information request and assuming 15 minutes for the average request in the
future, this would be a reduction of over 12% of time spent on a routine and common task. While it
may not seem that this is a significant amount by itself, it should be noted that this is a small but
critical task that frequently pull staff away from other work reducing their effectiveness. The savings
here is not only in terms of reduced time on the task itself, but also what that means in terms of staff
distraction from more core duties. By modernizing the grants management process and
implementing automated workflows, the Senior Operations Manager stands to save approximately
30-40% of their total time. This reduction will enable them to focus on higher-level tasks that require
strategic thinking and decision-making, rather than being mired in basic communication and tracking
activities.
In addition, the frontline staff, consisting of four members, could experience a remarkable time
savings of up to 60% each. By freeing up this valuable time, the staff can redirect their efforts from
rote tasks, such as managing automatable grant agreements and subgrantee paperwork
compliance, towards more complex and impactful activities that leverage their expertise.
Overall, the initiative not only enhances efficiency but also optimizes the utilization of human
resources within the department, allowing staff to engage in more meaningful work that contributes
to the agency’s broader goals and objectives.
Change Management Plan:
The initiative to modernize the grants management system introduces several change management
challenges that need to be addressed for successful implementation. One significant challenge will
be resistance to change, as staff members may be reluctant to shift from familiar processes to a new
digital platform. To overcome this, it will be crucial to engage stakeholders early by involving staff in
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the development process and clearly communicating how the new system will make their work more
efficient and less time-consuming. Offering comprehensive training will also help staff gain
confidence in the new system, minimizing resistance.
Another challenge is the need for process alignment. Standardizing grant management procedures
could face pushback if existing processes are entrenched or if employees feel uncertain about how
their roles will change. The process mapped during the work session should be refined to ensure it
meets what staff desires for the future state and then vetted through executive leadership. This will
ensure the process not only meets the needs of the entire agency but will be enforceable as well.
Standardized training and clear documentation of new procedures will help to ensure consistency.
Additionally, ongoing support such as workshops and help desks can assist employees in adapting
to the standardized workflows.
Lack of technological readiness could also pose a barrier. Many employees may not be accustomed
to automated workflows, digital signatures, or accessing real-time data, leading to potential delays
in adoption. Training using both in-person courses and computer-based videos will be critical to
success.
In summary, addressing these challenges through clear communication, stakeholder engagement,
proper training, technological investment, and transparent resource allocation will help ensure that
the initiative successfully improves the efficiency and effectiveness of the department’s grants
management processes.
E&E-06: Improve E&E data transparency
This initiative in conjunction with the SEEK program rollout, directs E&E DEQ to make public data
available with insightful visualizations and insights in one place to improve customer service and
increase knowledge of department programs.
Initiative Overview and Current State:
E&E DEQ intends to make public data more readily available online to increase customer service.
E&E is currently phasing in the SEEK system which will allow for digitization of E&E’s processes and
improved data organization within a new SEEK data management tools.
E&E DEMR currently employs a RBDMS (Risk Based Data Management System), a suite of
integrated software products that assists state agencies in the regulating, oversight and
management of oil, gas and Underground Injection Control (UIC) facilities and activities. It was
developed by the Ground Water Protection Council (GWPC) and members states, in partnership with
the U.S. Department of Energy. RDBMS applications allow state regulatory agencies to efficiently
manage data related to permit applications and environmental inspections. The RBDMS software
enables E&E DEMR to populate Arkansas maps on their website with robust geographical
information system (GIS) layers. Users can search maps and drill down on location-specific sites to
obtain existing information on permits, inspection reports, and enforcement actions.
Making information readily available online would improve customer service and result in improved
operational efficiencies for E&E staff.
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Furthermore, E&E DEQ currently tracks division performance metrics (e.g., time to issue a permit,
number of inspection reports per person per month, etc.) manually. The SEEK implementation will
enable E&E DEQ to streamline this process by providing automated metric collection and dashboard
display of those metrics. These dashboards will provide managers with a more efficient way to
monitor performance, identify trends, and respond promptly should they identify a trend.
Rationale: The current phased implementation of the SEEK system allows for digitization of E&E’s
processes and organization of data into a modern database. This enables E&E to offer self-service
GIS mapping tools on their website. Creation of these self-service tools will reduce or eliminate
citizen data requests and free E&E staff from the need to respond to those requests.
The implementation of the SEEK software will also enable E&E to automate tracking of performance
metrics and enable E&E to develop internal performance metrics dashboards. These dashboards will
allow managers to identify and remediate performance trends and improve services through early
identification.
Implementation Considerations:
Recommended steps for improving internal and external data transparency (future state):
• Form a project team with IT and programmatic leadership to support the project’s
implementation. (Complete)
• The project team should conduct a comprehensive analysis to identify the key DEQ programs
and the data sources associated with each program. (This step has been completed).
• The project team should investigate whether the Windsor Solutions document management
module (which is part of the SEEK contract) is a viable option for managing documents and
building out the GIS online platform. The team should also investigate “piggy-backing” on the
DEMR online portal as leverageable infrastructure for the GIS build out. (This step is in
progress).
• The project team should work with the Vendor to organize and migrate existing data (e.g.,
permits, inspection reports, enforcement actions, etc.). The project team should perform
user acceptance testing (UAT) to ensure accuracy. (This step is in progress).
• Once the team has completed sufficient UAT, go-live with the new features on the E&E
website. (This step is in progress).
• The project team, working with a Vendor, should design and develop a user-friendly interface
or dashboard that provides easy access to the internal performance metrics, allowing users
to easily identify and monitor trends. (This step is in progress).
• The project team should engage with stakeholders, including department staff, external
users, and other relevant parties, to gather feedback and incorporate their requirements and
suggestions into the dashboards. (This step is in progress).
• The project team should meet with each division to evaluate how their dashboard is working
and identify opportunities for improvement such as: 1) missing metrics that may need to be
incorporated; 2) measures that can be removed due to low utility; and 3) discussion about
evolution of measures to include more efficiency and outcome measures.
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• E&E should regularly monitor and evaluate the use of the dashboards, gather user feedback,
and make necessary adjustments and improvements to enhance effectiveness.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
• There is a risk that the data feeding into the external and internal data tools would be
incomplete or inaccurate. E&E intends to closely oversee and test SEEK to ensure data
feeding into the system is as complete and accurate as possible.
• There is a risk that there would be a lack of stakeholder buy-in and support for the
performance metric dashboards as the dashboards will make performance more visible. E&E
intends to involve stakeholders from the beginning and communicate the benefits/objectives
and obtain their input to address concerns.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources
E&E may support this initiative within the funding currently allocated for all software projects
including the SEEK contract and use existing E&E staff resources to form the project team.
Currently, E&E intends to reassign technical and program staff away from their day-to-day operations
to participate in team activities.
E&E has recently identified one source of potential funding. The Energy Office has received grant
funding to develop and implement a public facing portal for their customers to meet the need to have
data more easily accessible online. Windsor Solutions is building this portal and it is possible that,
once built, the portal platform could be leveraged for other data needs. E&E could build the database
for the portal and leverage it for additional uses. The thought is to start with the Energy Office data,
but once the infrastructure is built, extend the platform’s use to other data types like permits and
inspection reports. E&E leadership is in the early stages of exploring this possibility.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
Publishing data that is easily accessible through a GIS interface will allow E&E to better serve the
public and be more responsive to citizen need for data.
The development and implementation of internal performance metric dashboards will require a
process change from how these metrics are currently captured and monitored. Some ways to
support this change include identifying internal E&E resources to work on this project and reducing
their operational responsibilities to allow them time to work on this project. Once the dashboards
are implemented, the project team could hold lunch and learns to allow peers to share best practices
in how they are using the dashboards to identify and address problems in their business units; and
provide tip sheets on how to interpret and effectively utilize the dashboards to identify trends and
remediate issues.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The success of
this initiative will be measured by the implementation and phased roll-out of external GIS data and
metrics of the data’s use by citizens and department staff. Performance indicators could include
data utilization metrics (e.g., number of unique weekly views). In addition to performance measures,
E&E could consider measuring more intangible goals (e.g., improving internal and external
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stakeholder satisfaction). E&E could potentially measure improved satisfaction through:
• Post-deployment survey of external user satisfaction.
• Post-deployment survey of internal users to measure satisfaction with the performance
metric dashboard.
• Citizen focus groups to gather information on user likes/dislikes and use of this information
to improve the website.
• Staff focus groups to gather information on the performance metric dashboards and use of
this information to improve the dashboards.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: Based on E&E’s analysis, leadership expects E&E-6 to have a fiscally
neutral impact as the project will leverage existing funding allocation for SEEK and potentially the
Energy Office’s public facing portal. In the short term, project staff are sacrificing operational duties
to devote time to this project. Once the project is deployed, staff will be able to resume full
operational duties. Although difficult to quantify, E&E expects operational savings from the websites
ability to provide increased citizen self-service and E&E staff not having to respond to FOIA requests.
Change Management Plan: E&E could use the communication plan in Figure 9 to
communicate changes to stakeholders.
Figure 7 – E&E-06 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
External stakeholders • E&E has developed an exciting • Press release • Alan York
new GIS user interface.
Citizens can use this interface
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Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
to drill down on applications, • Website
permits, inspection reports, banner
etc. by location to obtain data message
they need. • Emails
distributed
via existing
stakeholder
lists
Internal stakeholders • E&E is developing internal • Staff • Alan York
dashboards to help the meetings.
department before more data • All staff
driven. emails.
• These tools are meant to help
managers have access to real-
time information about their
staff’s performance.
• Explain the categories of
metrics available, how the
metrics were chosen, and how
E&E developed the
dashboards.
• Ask for their support in
monitoring the impact of the
dashboards and identifying
areas for improvement in
future iterations.
E&E-07: Develop and institute more concise enforcement templates
The focus of this initiative is to create and implement streamlined templates for DEQ enforcement
paperwork to reduce the time spent writing notices.
Initiative Overview and Current State: E&E plays a crucial role in safeguarding the state's
environment and natural resources. By issuing permits, DEQ ensures that entities operate in an
environmentally responsible manner, focusing on protection and restoration. To enforce these
standards, DEQ conducts inspections to verify compliance with the permit terms and identify any
violations to the permit permissions. When necessary, E&E DEQ takes action to address issues,
which may include implementing restorative measures and/or imposing penalties to ensure
accountability and environmental preservation.
EE-07 aims to create and implement templates for DEQ enforcement to reduce time spent writing
notices. DEQ has encountered ongoing challenges regarding the standardization of inspection and
enforcement templates. One of the key difficulties is reaching a consensus across the various
branches on what content these standardized templates should require. This lack of agreement is
preventing the adoption of a standardized template and much of DEQ’s documentation continues to
rely on manual, narrative documentation. While some enforcement documents are sent electronically, a
significant portion remain in hard copy, contributing to inefficiencies in the process.
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The SEEK system, a hub-and-spoke environmental data management platform, is in the process of
being implemented. This system is designed to centralize data while building compliance and
enforcement workflows that cater to the needs of both field inspectors and enforcement personnel.
The SEEK system is able to develop templates that enforce structured data entry and reduce
narrative free-form text. The template’s structured data entry prevents users from entering
inaccurate or incomplete data and greatly increases the ease of reporting, as the underlying data is
easy to aggregate and report on.
Rationale: EE-07 centers on streamlining and standardizing templates across multiple DEQ
branches—Air, Water, and Land—by transitioning from a largely manual, paper-based system to a
more efficient, electronic one. The current process is hindered by the challenges of managing both
internal and external signatures, where physical documents are mailed to external facilities (e.g., Air
sending forms to facilities for signatures), returned, and then require internal signatures. This back-
and-forth leads to delays, inefficiencies, and makes it harder to track actions and statuses. DEQ
plans to shift the entire process to the SEEK platform (see EE-12) which would allow digital signatures
and automate workflows.
This initiative aims to standardize enforcement templates across the three branches by using SEEK’s
capability to "mash" templates together through coding, ensuring consistency and efficiency. Each
branch has selected a permitting category (i.e., “regime”) to serve as a proof of concept for this new
combined template and new electronic workflows. Water is focusing on construction storm water
permitting, Land on regulated storage tanks, and Air Quality on asbestos remediation permitting. By
focusing on these specific areas, DEQ plans to maximize the initial impact of the initiative and use the
lessons learned to expand further. By implementing templates, DEQ can move away from narrative-
heavy forms to more structured data such as "yes/no" checkboxes. This will improve data collection
consistency across divisions and improve DEQ ability to consistently capture and analyze data.
The current state process map is shown below in Figure 8.
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Figure 8 – E&E-07 Current State Process Map
Source: Developed in work session with E&E staff held on August 27, 2024.
Implementation Considerations:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
DEQ faces a daunting task to standardize templates across divisions. This labor-intensive task
requires subject matter experts from the different divisions to come together and agree on a
structured data approach to collecting data and agree to discontinue their current method of
collecting data in narrative form. The risk is both the amount of time needed and that staff might not
see the value in standardizing templates. DEQ could mitigate this risk through an iterative approach
(finish and deploy one template) and integrate template design into existing development workflows
to limit additional time spent on new changes. There are also challenges to making the template
applicable for enforcement actions across different departments, including both permits, and
violations. DEQ should establish clear communication channels and involve key stakeholders from
the initiative outset to ensure the template design captures all necessary enforcement action types
and includes all required information.
In preparing to implement this initiative, DEQ identified potential challenges/barriers to improving
templates in a facilitated work session, the results of which are shown in the diagram presented in
Figure 9. In this diagram, the goal to improve templates is summarized in the blue box; the potential
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challenges the team may experience are shown in red boxes, and the related solutions are shown in
green.
Figure 9 – E&E 07 Interference Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with E&E staff held on August 27, 2024.
Recommended Steps for Establishing the Future State:
A team has been formed with subject matter experts from each division to begin developing and
vetting the templates. DEQ has identified the following steps that need to be executed to implement
the future state:
1. Review and analyze the current enforcement paperwork to identify common elements and
areas for streamlining. (Completed)
2. Engage with key stakeholders and subject matter experts to gather their input and insights on
the enforcement paperwork requirements and potential areas for improvement. (Completed)
3. Work closely with the SEEK team to understand the capabilities and limitations of the
underlying technology and ensure that the templates can be easily integrated into the SEEK
system. (Completed)
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4. Based on the analysis and input from stakeholders, begin developing draft templates for the
enforcement paperwork. (In Progress)
5. Select a small group of users to pilot test the draft templates and gather feedback on their
usability, effectiveness, and any areas for improvement. (In Progress)
6. Incorporate the feedback received from the pilot test and make necessary adjustments and
refinements to the templates to enhance their usability and effectiveness. (Not Started)
7. Create training materials and user guides to help staff understand how to use the new
templates effectively and efficiently. (Not Started)
8. Implement the finalized templates across the relevant departments or teams, providing
training and support to ensure a smooth transition. (Not Started)
9. Continuously monitor the usage and effectiveness of the templates, gather feedback from
users, and evaluate the impact on reducing the time spent writing notices. Make necessary
adjustments and improvements based on the feedback received. (Not Started)
Alignment of Department priorities with staffing and resources: The Department
already has the necessary resources to successfully implement EE-07, and the initiative is, in fact,
well underway. The SEEK system has been deployed, the work to standardize templates is underway,
and branches are moving toward adopting electronic workflows. This groundwork ensures that the
department is well-positioned to achieve the goals of the initiative.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
Below are the major recommendations for process improvement from the work sessions:
• Utilize SEEK templates to standardize and simplify reports: This involves using
standardized templates within the SEEK system to streamline and simplify the structure of
reports, ensuring consistency across all submissions.
• Send communication through SEEK in and out: Shifting from traditional paper or email
communication to using the SEEK platform for all internal and external communications. This
ensures that all correspondence related to reports is tracked and managed in a centralized
system.
• Training on how to write and review reports: Conducting training sessions for staff on how
to properly write and review reports, ensuring everyone understands the standardized
format, as well as how to use SEEK for these tasks.
• "In Compliance" reports don’t route through supervisor: A process change allowing
reports deemed to be "In Compliance" to bypass supervisor review, expediting the process
and reducing unnecessary steps for routine reports.
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It is important to note that while not all recommendations involve a change in the substance of how
tasks are performed, they may address other related factors, such as the mode of communication
(electronic rather than written), the training of staff, and simplifying approval workflows. These
adjustments aim to enhance efficiency without fundamentally altering the core activities.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The goal is to
streamline and standardize enforcement processes by leveraging the SEEK platform, reducing
inefficiencies, and improving communication and workflows. To evaluate the success of this
initiative, the following performance metrics can be established:
• Average days from initial inspection to delivery of informal and formal enforcement actions
(expected to reduce);
• Percent of enforcement actions processed electronically (expected to increase);
• Number of reports requiring revisions due to missing/inaccurate information (expected to
decrease); and,
• Number of staff trained in using SEEK and report writing best practices (expected to
increase).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented:
Using structured templates that force the user to enter accurate and complete data will significantly
reduce the number of incomplete/inaccurate documents that DEQ staff must review. Presenting
DEQ reviewers with complete information will eliminate the need for staff to go “back and forth” to
obtain additional information. Structured data, as opposed to narrative free-form data, improves
DEQ’s ability to aggregate, analyze, and report on enforcement data.
Change Management Plan: Below are five potential challenges along with corresponding
mitigation steps.
Training Gaps
Challenge: Employees may lack the necessary skills to effectively use the SEEK system and adapt to
new reporting templates, leading to errors and inefficiencies.
Solution: Develop a comprehensive training program that includes hands-on workshops,
instructional materials, and ongoing support. This should cater to different learning styles and
provide opportunities for staff to ask questions and practice using the new system in a safe
environment. Consider appointing change champions within each branch to assist their peers.
Resource Allocation
Challenge: Existing staff may struggle to balance their current responsibilities with the additional
tasks related to the initiative, leading to burnout and decreased productivity.
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Solution: Executive leadership should ensure that adequate resources are allocated to support the
initiative without overburdening staff. This may involve temporarily redistributing workloads,
prioritizing tasks, or even hiring additional personnel to assist with the implementation.
E&E-12: Improve Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) permitting
process and review
This initiative seeks to improve DEQ permitting process and review to streamline and expedite issuing
defensible and protective permits by:
• Implementing a tiered review communication channel for permits to ensure all necessary
positions (e.g., geologists, engineers) are aware of applications in process and to reduce
application processing time
• Apply lean process mapping to streamline each permitting process to map and quantify time
for each step, aiming to reduce permit cycle time
• Encourage and facilitate permit applications to be submitted through a public-facing smart
form in SEEK, and require permits received through alternative channels to be uploaded to
the SEEK for processing, with the aim of increasing the percentage of digitally processed
permits
• Offer additional technical permit application support for local applicants applying for
permits, targeting an in successful local permit applications
Initiative Overview and Current State: E&E’s permitting processes face multiple
challenges:
• Highly Manual Processes: Although there has been some digitization, especially in the
Water and Air Branches with the transition to SEEK (the next generation ePortal), the Office of
Land Resources remains largely manual. The Land permits and documentation has yet to
fully use the ePortal continuing the inefficiency of the paper-based process.
• Physical Submissions: Facilities and applicants predominantly rely on paper-based
methods using mail for submitting materials, which is a slow, inefficient process.
• Cumbersome Review Processes: The review process is slowed down by the number of
approvers and the slow, paper-based hand-offs between reviewers. The process consumes
considerable time and energy from department staff across all levels of the organization.
• Unclear Communication: Communication between the department and stakeholders is often
worded unclearly, leading to confusion.
• Complex Requirements: Facilities often struggle to understand the complex requirements
of the permitting process. The requirement complexity confuses facilities further slowing
progress and leading to errors or incomplete submissions.
• Lack of Motivation for Timely Action: Facilities show little motivation to respond to
requirements promptly unless they directly benefit from the requirement. For example,
facilities tend to delay submitting renewals, but when awaiting construction permits, they
demand a quick turnaround.
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E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Low Administrative Completeness Review Standards: The department’s administrative
review process is sometimes lenient, allowing incomplete or inaccurate submissions to
enter the system. This slows throughout, as staff must invest extra time and effort to
establish a “full kit” of necessary information before proceeding.
The team constructed a strategic compass diagram as part of the work on this initiative. The
Strategic Compass shows the permitting process at a high level. This diagram has multiple
purposes. The first is to help participants establish the overall process goal to focus the team on
the purpose of permitting is as a way to begin the work. it identifies each of the major milestone
steps in the process and identifies primary bottleneck, as each process has a bottleneck. Finally,
the team identifies what “good” looks like so that the solution can then be focused on improving
the bottlenecks, thus improving the system.
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E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 10 – E&E-12 Solid Waste General Permit Current State Map
Source: Developed in work session with E&E staff held on September 11, 2024.
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E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 11 – E&E-12 Hazardous Waste Class 1 Modification Current State Map
Source: Developed in work session with E&E staff held on September 11, 2024.
Rationale: E&E-12 proposes a comprehensive overhaul of the current DEQ permitting process by
fully adopting the SEEK system for all types of permits and media, following the successful
implementation in the Air and Water divisions. This transition would highly encourage that all
facilities submit materials electronically, eliminating the reliance on paper-based physical
submissions and standardizing communication. To further enhance efficiency, the initiative would
enforce the use of approved templates for all submissions, ensuring consistency and completeness.
The templates guide the external user through the input process, requiring complete information
before letting the user move to the next step. E&E staff is then able to narrow the review process to
the smaller amount of non-template material, thus significantly reducing the time and effort spent
reviewing incomplete submissions, resulting in fewer delays caused by incomplete information.
Moreover, the initiative recommends that E&E undertake a RACI (Responsible, Accountable,
Consulted, Informed) analysis to clarify roles within the organization. This analysis would help E&E
intentionally decide which levels of staff are responsible for reviewing and approving different
elements of work and who simply needs to be kept informed. In some cases, approval may only be
required if specific conditions are met. By establishing a clear and structured approach to deciding
who does what, the department can prevent unnecessary involvement from staff who do not need to
be part of the review process, thus speeding up workflows and improving overall efficiency.
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A critical component of the initiative is for DEQ to implement training programs for facilities to help
them effectively transition to the SEEK system. This would not only help ensure facility compliance
with the new submission protocols, but also improve the quality of submissions. The department
could incentivize facilities to participate in the training by offering priority review for those facilities
where staff successfully complete the required training.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
The team identified the following items as potential risks and obstacles to the success of the initiative
during the work sessions. Each bullet is a potential obstacle that the team identified, and each sub
bullet is a potential solution or mitigation of that obstacle. To facilitate the full exchange of ideas the
team was instructed to disregard concerns of cost, feasibility, approval, etc. If Department
leadership decides to pursue any of the ideas, they should test the feasibility before proceeding. The
barriers and mitigations include:
• Prioritization in general is unclear vis-a-vis who sets it; political concerns; facilities directly
contacting leadership also slows process
o Copy Air’s weekly report and use it for manager to prioritize work
o Prioritized based on age unless Director/AD instructs elsewise
• Nonpayment of fees slows down the permitting process; mailed checks sometimes arrive
after subsequent late fees or without ID information causing delays due to research needed
o Bar facility from any action until payment is made
o Stop newspaper public notice requirement
o Require/standardize digital payments
• Consistent turnover meaning we don’t have adequate number of trained staff, hurting
bandwidth of new and experienced staff
o Include career steps and upwards mobility
o Address pay scale
• Workload demand is inconsistent with the head count in the agency
o Cross-training
• Extra levels of review (public notice) can introduce errors into the permitting process
o RACI analysis to determine who needs to simply be informed
o Once templates are approved, public notices reviews should be restricted to non-
template content
o Templates should be reviewed periodically (3 years) not with each throughput
• Public notices may have errors such as grammatical, typos, dates, titles, etc.
o Once templates are approved, public notices reviews should be restricted to non-
template content
o Templates should be reviewed periodically (3 years) not with each throughput
• Facilities don’t read the permit or rules causing compliance issues and delays in reviewing the
application
o Permit Cover Sheet with Renewal dates, operator info, contact person, etc. to help
highlight commonly overlooked info
o Establish training for facilities in writing and submitting materials and prioritize those
applications/reviews – possibly working w/ AEF
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E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Facilities aren’t motivated to respond unless it’s a construction project (they receive
something)
o Candid conversations with consultants about the root cause of some issues
• Facilities often slow in responding, delaying the process until it’s an emergency for them –
trying to prioritize it then
o Need some way to enforce the rules “stick” - figure out how to return an application?
o Begin prompting Facilities at certain time thresholds
o Candid conversations with consultants about the root cause of some issues
o Prioritize full-kit, compliant reviews
• The applications can sometimes get stuck during routing of NOD letters and approval
o Set thresholds for who need to review
o Verify positions that need to review
o RACI analysis to determine who needs to simply be informed
o Reorganize in some other manner to streamline review
• There is no standardization for submittals from facilities
o Encourage a level/standard of citation in the document
o Set the system to require full-kit
o Establish training for facilities in writing and submitting materials and prioritize those
applications/reviews – possibly working w/ AEF
o Require ePortal for all facilities
• Engineers and geologists have a huge quantity of throughput to review
o Include career steps and upwards mobility
o Address pay scale
o Verify need for review
o Identify other staff that could provide those reviews
o Opening more positions
In preparing to implement this initiative, E&E identified potential challenges/barriers to improving
templates in a facilitated work session, the results of which are shown in the diagram presented in
Figure 12. In this diagram, the goal to improve templates is summarized in the blue box; the potential
challenges the team may experience are shown in red boxes, and the related solutions are shown in
green.
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E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 12 – E&E-12 Interference Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with E&E staff held on September 11, 2024.
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E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Recommended Steps for Establishing the Future State:
• Conduct a thorough assessment of the current state of permit processing performance,
broken down by media and permit type
• Starting with the permit types with the longest permitting timelines, apply lean process
mapping to detail and measure the time taken for each step in the permitting process.
• Implement a streamlined review process for relevant permit types, ensuring essential
personnel (e.g., geologists, engineers) are aware of and can access permits currently being
processed.
• Organize an inter-media learning session to share and document best practices from highly
digital permit types with other media and permit types.
• Develop and apply proven strategies for encouraging digital permit applications from better
forming to underperforming permit types.
• Meet with Associate Directors to identify which permits depend heavily on local (i.e., non-
expert, non-consultant) applications and explore opportunities to provide additional
support.
• Implement support strategies for the identified permits, starting with those that have proven
effective in other media or permit types.
• Track progress of SEEK permit applications and processing times. Adjust as needed.
Figure 13 below shows the future state process for solid waste general permits and Figure 14 shows
the future state process for hazardous waste class 1 permit.
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E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 13 – E&E-12 Solid Waste General Permit Future State Map
Source: Developed in work session with E&E staff held on September 25, 2024.
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E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Figure 14– E&E-12 Hazardous Waste Class 1 Modification Future State Map
Source: Developed in work session with E&E staff held on September 25, 2024.
Alignment of Department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative
outlines the very systems that will enhance the department’s ability to fulfill its mission efficiently
and transparently.
Like many organizations, the department faces resource constraints, particularly in staffing.
However, through effective coordination across teams and media, the existing resources should be
sufficient to gradually acquire, deploy, and integrate the SEEK system for all media over time. This
collaborative approach ensures that even with limited staff, the department can move toward full
implementation.
Furthermore, the department already possesses the resources needed to conduct the RACI analysis
and make the necessary changes. By clearly defining roles and responsibilities through this analysis,
the department can optimize how staff are deployed across different areas, ensuring the routing of
approvals is “right-sized” so that staff who don’t need to be approvers are not unnecessarily involved.
The careful orchestration of resources—similar to project management and process flow initiatives
in other improvement efforts – will be key to the successes of this system-wide change.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans: The process
changes associated with Initiative E&E-12 primarily involve how each step of the permitting process
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E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
is carried out, rather than altering the steps themselves. For instance, while letters are still generated
at particular points in the process, these will now be automatically generated. This automation will
dramatically reduce the time staff spend creating letters—by almost 100%—while also minimizing
the opportunity for errors, ensuring higher accuracy and consistency in communication.
The initiative also includes a training program for facilities, which will focus on reducing the number
of technically inadequate applications submitted. By improving the quality of submissions, the cycle
time for reviewing and processing applications will be significantly reduced. This will allow the
department to process permits faster and more efficiently.
The structuring of the media and review processes within the department has undergone notable
changes, particularly in terms of leadership. By aligning the expertise of scientists with the efficiency
of regulatory practices, DEQ can ensure that the environmental resources are adequately protected
while also maintaining a timely and effective permitting process. This careful examination will allow
the department to refine its structure in a way that maximizes both environmental safeguarding and
operational efficiency.
The most significant recommendation is the full adoption of ePermitting, specifically the SEEK
system already in use by the Air and Water media. This transition will ensure that the permitting steps
are followed, and the automation will ensure the consistency of the workflow.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The following metrics have been identified as critical measures of success for this initiative:
• Permit processing time (average cycle time per permit) (expected to decrease);
• Number of Notice of Deficiency (NOD) letters issued (expected to decrease);
• Percentage of permit applications submitted electronically (expected to increase);
• Staff time spent on manual tasks (e.g., generating letters, reviews) (expected to decrease);
• Number of technically adequate first-time submissions from facilities (expected to increase);
• Stakeholder satisfaction (internal and external) with the permitting process (expected to
increase); and,
• Internal compliance with approved templates and submission standards (expected to
increase).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: The potential savings with this initiative are significant. Looking only at the
two permits described above, the work session was able to assess the time spent today on each task
and the potential time spent in the future. For time spent today, staff assessed the optimistic time for
each step which reflects the amount of time it would take to do the task if everything were present
and complete and no other priorities were concerned. Staff also accepts the average or typical time
it takes for each step in the process given typical workload and the typical condition of the work when
it reaches each step, and finally the pessimistic time frame or the maximum amount of time it would
take at each step but without the step being “broken.” This gives each step a range of time that an
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E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
employee could reasonably take. By comparing this with the amount of time the same task would
take in the future we can calculate an estimated savings, particularly for those steps that will be
eliminated or fully automated.
The tables below show the potential value the department stands to realize from implementing SEEK.
For each process there are three assessments. The first is the main process assuming that there are
no deficiencies or technical inadequacy in the permit application, which is reflected by “Main.” “NTA-
S” reflects that the permit was not technically adequate but it was only a small issue. “NTA-L” shows
that it was not a technically adequate permit upon first review and it was a larger issue. Since there
are countless permutations of these three paths that an application could take, only the simplest
were used for this analysis.
Figure 15 – E&E-12 Time Savings Calculation
Source: Developed in work session with E&E staff held on September 25, 2024.
By far the smallest improvement is 18% estimated for the primary process for solid waste general
permits. This is because much of that process is manual (e.g., reviews) but even with the manual
processes, it still shows a significant improvement. The remainder of the steps all show moving to
an automated process generates a 70% improvement. E&E can further improve this time savings by
introducing a RACI analysis and training facilities.
Change Management Plan: As E&E transitions to a fully digital ePermitting system under E&E-
12, several change management challenges are likely to arise. Successfully addressing these
challenges will be critical to ensuring the initiative’s smooth implementation and long-term success.
Below is a list of potential obstacles, along with recommendations for overcoming them. These
solutions are designed to ease the transition, support staff and stakeholders, and help ensure the
department realizes the full benefits of the new processes and technology.
1. Resistance to Process Automation
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E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
• Challenge: Staff accustomed to manual processes may resist the full adoption of the
SEEK ePermitting system, fearing loss of control or increased complexity.
• Recommendation: Implement clear communication that highlights the benefits of
automation, such as reduced workload, fewer errors, and faster processing times. Offer
hands-on training sessions and allow time for staff to adjust to the new system.
Encourage feedback and make staff part of the transition process to increase buy-in.
2. Limited Technical Skills among Staff or Facilities
• Challenge: Some employees or facility stakeholders may struggle with adopting new
digital tools due to a lack of technical proficiency.
• Recommendation: Provide extensive training for both internal staff and external facility
users, including step-by-step guides and video tutorials. Ensure ongoing technical
support is available during and after the transition to the new system. Consider
implementing a phased rollout to allow users to gradually familiarize themselves with
SEEK.
3. Fear of Increased Accountability
• Challenge: The introduction of a RACI analysis may cause anxiety among staff,
particularly those uncomfortable with increased visibility and responsibility for specific
tasks.
• Recommendation: Emphasize that RACI is meant to improve efficiency by clearly
defining roles, not to overburden staff. Highlight how it will streamline workflows and
reduce unnecessary review steps. Regularly reinforce the message that accountability
leads to more effective teamwork and improved outcomes.
4. Inadequate Facility Compliance with New Submission Standards
• Challenge: Facilities may fail to comply with the mandatory use of electronic
submissions and approved templates, causing delays and confusion.
• Recommendation: Create clear, easy-to-understand guidelines for facility submissions
and offer incentives, such as faster review times for facilities that comply with training
and submission requirements. Penalties or longer processing times could be applied for
non-compliance, but this should be a last resort.
5. Difficulty in Transitioning from Physical to Digital Communication
• Challenge: Shifting from physical submissions and mail-based communication to fully
digital communication may be difficult for some stakeholders and internal staff.
• Recommendation: Offer parallel processes during the initial stages of the transition,
where both digital and physical submissions are accepted. Gradually phase out physical
methods, while consistently communicating deadlines and expectations for going fully
digital. Ensure seamless communication through automated notifications and provide
guidance on email communication best practices.
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E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
6. Concerns about the Quality and Fairness of Review Standards
• Challenge: Staff may fear that changes to review levels through the RACI analysis could
reduce the quality of permit reviews or lead to an unfair distribution of workload.
• Recommendation: Involve key stakeholders in the development of the RACI framework
to ensure reviews are appropriately assigned and workloads remain balanced. Communicate
clearly that quality and fairness will not be compromised, and that reviews will still happen
at critical points, just with greater efficiency.
7. Communication Gaps Between Stakeholders During the Transition
• Challenge: During the rollout of the SEEK system and new processes, communication
breakdowns between internal staff, facilities, and external stakeholders could occur
• Recommendation: Establish clear communication channels from the outset, including
regular updates and check-ins with all stakeholders. Create a FAQ and help desk specifically
for questions related to the new system. Provide timelines, expectations, and reminders to
ensure everyone is informed throughout the transition.
By proactively addressing these potential challenges through training, communication, and gradual
implementation, the department can ensure a smoother transition to the new ePermitting process
under Initiative E&E-12.
Figure 16 below provides suggested messaging for the EE-12 changes.
Figure 16 – E&E-12 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Responsible Party
Internal Create an FAQ and help • Staff meetings Alan York
stakeholders desk specifically for • Town Hall meetings
questions related to the • All staff emails
new system. • Lunch and Learns
Provide timelines,
expectations, and
reminders to ensure
everyone is informed
throughout the
transition.
Hold town hall meetings
and lunch and learns to
introduce staff to the
new process/system.
Facility staff Clear, easy-to- • Website banner Alan York
understand guidelines message
for facility submissions.
Facility staff are • Emails to facilities
encouraged to take the
SEEK training that will
help them improve their
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E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Audience Key Messages Modalities Responsible Party
compliance and reduce
time spent.
Message that E&E offers
incentives, such as
faster review times for
facilities that comply
with training and
submission
requirements.
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E&E Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024
Strategic Management Plan:
Arkansas Department of Parks, Heritage
and Tourism
Table of Contents
Overview ............................................................................................................................... 1
Recommended Organizational Structure ................................................................................... 2
How this Department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective future department .................... 3
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation ................................................ 4
PHT-02: Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and efficiency.................................... 4
PHT-04: Consider public private partnerships with Arkansan businesses to improve guest
experience ................................................................................................................................................ 7
PHT-07: Centralize grant data across all divisions and standardize grant management practices 16
PHT-09: Ensure consistent administration practices across divisions .............................................. 20
PHT-14: Use data to improve guest experience ................................................................................... 24
PHT-15: Establish customer service training ....................................................................................... 28
PHT-19: Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business critical/duplicative
applications across all divisions of PHT .............................................................................. 35
Overview
The mission of the Arkansas Department of Parks, Heritage, and Tourism (PHT) is to protect and
promote the state’s natural, cultural and historical assets, contributing to a thriving economy and
high quality of life. The Parks Division promotes the state as a tourist destination, overseeing and
managing the State’s 52 state parks, situated on 55,000 acres and maintaining parks within 49
counties. The Heritage Division promotes and preserves the state’s natural and cultural history and
heritage, managing four historic museums and four cultural preservation agencies the Natural
Heritage Commission, Historic Preservation Program, Arts Council, and State Archives. The Tourism
Division advances the Arkansas economy through the promotion of travel to the state, managing 13
Welcome Centers, as well as the Department’s digital marketing strategy including operation of
websites and social media platforms. Collectively, PHT’s values include a commitment of service,
excellence, stewardship, accountability, teamwork, respect, and adaptability.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 1
Through the Arkansas Forward project, a 2024 initiative to improve the efficiency and effectiveness
of Arkansas’ 15 cabinet-level departments, PHT prioritized implementation of seven initiatives that
improve the organization’s efficiency and operations and improving constituent experience in
engaging with the sites and services managed by PHT.
This Strategic Management Plan (“Plan”) memorializes the work completed by PHT during Arkansas
Forward, translating the department’s vision into a plan consisting of recommended organizational
structure, key initiatives prioritized for immediate implementation, and related performance
metrics. A companion project plan (“Work Plan”) provides a more detailed resource to support
implementation of the initiatives by PHT’s Arkansas Forward project management team.
Recommended Organizational Structure
PHT’s current organization chart is shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1 – Current Organizational Structure
Since consolidation in 2019, the Department’s primary focus has been to integrate its three
programmatic divisions into one cohesive department. Because the divisions previously existed as
independent departments, they continue to operate autonomously. PHT has implemented a shared
services model where possible to improve efficiency under the Chief Fiscal Officer and Chief of Staff
(for information technology, human resources, finance, communication, and legal as examples).
The recommendation for PHT’s future state organization is summarized in Figure 2 (with the green
boxes signifying changes from the current structure). As part of Arkansas Forward, PHT conducted a
comprehensive review of each division to identify organizational improvements in span of control,
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 2
the number of organizational layers, and opportunities for shared services consolidation, among
others. Through this process, the following recommendations were identified:
• Address span of control within three programmatic divisions through use of deputy director
roles. The Department has previously received approval for these positions.
• Continue work of shared services consolidation by consolidation of similar functional units.
Some examples of opportunities include exhibitry, Geographic Information Systems (GIS)
mapping, and grants management.
These recommendations will be discussed in greater detail in PHT-02.
Figure 2 – Recommended Organizational Structure
How this Department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective
future department
PHT's formation in 2019 brought together three distinct divisions with unique missions, purposes,
and organizational cultures. Since 2019, the Department has implemented a shared services
operating model to achieve efficiencies and worked to improve collaboration across the divisions.
Arkansas Forward continues this work out of recognition that more can be accomplished, beginning
the changes to the organizational structure to bring similar functions together. Several initiatives
share that common thread of improving the effectiveness and efficiency of the department by
collaborating across divisions, including:
• PHT-07 to centralize grant administration and data,
• PHT-09 to standardize financial practices,
• PHT-14 to collaborate in collection of customer service data, and
• PHT-15 relating to reducing use of duplicative applications.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 3
To become the most effective and efficient organization possible, PHT's leadership will need to
complete the vision of departmental integration established in 2019 and manage the cultural change
that accompanies the organizational changes and new business practices included in these
recommendations.
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward
Implementation
PHT leadership generated 19 ideas to improve departmental effectiveness and efficiency, before
prioritizing seven initiatives for immediate implementation as part of Arkansas Forward that focus
on improving operations and creating better experiences for the public.
PHT-02: Optimize manager roles and team size for better control and
efficiency
This initiative is part of the broader Arkansas Forward Agile Organization initiative and includes
implementing a tailored and modernized organization to ensure effective distribution of
management responsibilities, enhanced operational efficiency, and improved role clarity among
managerial positions.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Department includes three programmatic
divisions (Parks, Heritage, and Tourism) and since 2019, PHT has sought to consolidate the
independent divisions into one cohesive Department. As shown above in Figure 1, the bulk of the
organization’s staff are housed within these three divisions. The unique areas of focus and culture of
each division, as well as the organization’s structure have continued to perpetuate a siloed approach
to operations. Creation of shared services functions under the Chief of Staff and Chief Fiscal Officer
have achieved some efficiencies, but PHT desired to take a more comprehensive review to identify
additional ways to improve collaboration and efficiency through its organization design.
Rationale: Through a review of each division’s organization chart, including consideration of span
of control and organizational layers, which impact communication flow, quality of supervision, and
efficiency, additional recommendations for improvement were identified (summarized in Figure 2
above):
• The Division leaders have large spans of control. Some have already implemented and some
are in process of implementing deputy director positions to address span of control. Clear
roles and responsibilities will have to be established to minimize staff confusion and prevent
redundancy.
• The divisional structure has resulted in some inefficiencies, whereas teams of staff are
performing similar functions and not collaborating. Some examples include:
o Exhibitry: In the past, the Heritage Division has staffed each museum with a small
team, including one staff member who prepares educational programs and exhibits.
The Parks Division also has a small team to support exhibits at state parks. The work
performed by these staff is similar, but the siloed organization structure prevents
theircollaboration, sharing of best practices, and achieving efficiencies. These
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 4
resources can be combined into a one team under the Communication Director
(reporting to the Chief of Staff). Location of the team within the Chief of Staff’s
organization will ensure all divisions receive an appropriate level of support and
resources.
o Geographic Information System (GIS) Mapping: There are staff who perform GIS
mapping located within the Parks Division and within the Heritage Division’s
Arkansas Natural Heritage Commission. These staff have a specialized skillset and
use common tools. Consolidating these resources within the Parks Division’s
Planning and Development Team will allow them to be cross-trained, collaborate to
support all PHT GIS needs, and share GIS tools under a Master Services Agreement
(MSA) that supports more favorable pricing.
o Grants Management: PHT needs to create a centralized grant function within the
Office of the Chief Fiscal Officer (PHT-07). Maintaining divisional staff supporting
grants in their existing divisions would enable them to continue performing other
duties for the same divisions. The central team will have programmatic authority over
grants management and the divisional staff will report to the team with a dotted line
reporting structure.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – PHT Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with PHT staff.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
There could be some staff abrasion related to the re-organization. Division leadership may fear they
will receive less support from the designated function if it is centralized. The impacted staff may have
concerns about changes to their role and chain of command. Staff joining the new functional teams
may not want to combine their function with other divisional staff. A clear communication plan is
needed to make sure leadership and staff understand the purpose behind the reorganization. In
addition, training and teambuilding resources can be made available to the new teams to support
their formation.
Recommended steps for establishing new organization structure (future state):
• Identify changes required by division (in process).
• Review legal implications of proposed changes (in process).
• Obtain leadership approval for changes (in process).
• Develop a Communication Plan – Time should be spent by division leaders and
Communication resources to ensure leaders understand “why” behind moves and can
support change. PHT leadership can model the “change story” work they performed during
the Arkansas Forward visioning session to create an updated “change story” related to the
additional changes being made. Additional tools such as scripts, frequently asked
questions, and fact sheets should be developed to support leaders in having discussions
with their teams about the anticipated changes.
o Coordinate the announcements to support staff. It is a best practice for staff to receive
news of a transfer or major team change from their direct supervisor. If staff are moving
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 5
teams, they should also receive contact from their new supervisor. After all individuals
impacted directly by major team changes or moves are notified, a team meeting should
occur. As these conversations move to deeper layers of the organization, it becomes
important for leaders to be ambassadors of the message. The leadership team should
understand what is happening and why so they can facilitate these discussions.
• Determine the physical location of new staff.
• Complete changes within personnel systems.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: The proposed
organization chart for PHT is provided above in Figure 2. Realignment of PHT in these areas will help
the department further achieve its mission and implement Arkansas Forward.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
Process changes are expected with some of the organization redesign, with examples including:
Each of the teams (exhibitry, GIS mapping, and grants) will need to review standard team protocols
and potentially revise them (to take into account best practices used across divisions), as well as
train staff to these policies. The teams can review existing or create new maps of step-by-step
sequence of key tasks for each key process as a method to understand who is responsible for each
step, identify where there is divergence in practice, and highlight specific changes that are needed
in the “future state.” The department may consider an outside facilitator to help the team build
best practices and find efficiencies in the new shared processes as opposed to replicating the
existing process.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The intent of this
initiative is to improve the organization’s structure to support agility, decision making, and improved
flow of communication. There are diagnostic metrics that can be used to monitor the impact of this
initiative across the organization on an ongoing basis including:
• Span of control (size);
• Number of organizational layers.
In addition to these measures, surveys could be utilized for impacted staff during the transition to
identify and address any issues or concerns. Improvement in employee satisfaction scores of
management support/clarity of roles (could be enabled by survey).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: This initiative is not expected to result in short-term cost savings;
additional costs to implement are estimated to be $10,000 (for team building and training
investments). Long-term, should the consolidations of staffing reduce overall staffing needs, some
savings could be captured by PHT.
Change Management Plan: Figure 3 summarizes high level communication tasks, that are
also included in Appendix A – PHT Work Plan.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 6
Figure 3 – PHT-02 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Staff impacted by • PHT is making some changes in • Town hall. • Secretary
changes our organization structure as • Face-to-Face • Chief of Staff
part of Arkansas Forward. team • Impacted Division
• PHT is investing in our team as meetings with Leaders
a strategy to help us better leadership,
serve the state and fulfill our future
mission. manager, and
• Detailed description of former
changes, including specific manager.
changes for every team
impacted by the reorganization.
Everyone continues to have a
place on the team.
Other PHT staff • These changes are to • Town hall. • Communication
strengthen our team, support • All staff Director
collaboration, and enable more email.
efficient decision-making.
• High level summary of
changes.
• Address efficiency measures.
PHT-04: Consider public private partnerships with Arkansan
businesses to improve guest experience
This initiative seeks to enhance Arkansan experience through public private partnerships (PPP)
between Parks, Heritage and Tourism offerings and Arkansas businesses. Revenue opportunities
will be sought by leveraging new and existing partners to expand services and resources at Heritage
and Parks locations. Actionable strategies will be developed to establish and manage PPP
opportunities and deploy a pilot program for future expansion. PHT aims to implement this initiative
in alignment with the statewide strategy of optimizing the Arkansan citizen experience through the
utilization of revenue opportunities.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Today, State Parks in Arkansas provide various
outdoor recreational opportunities to hike, fish, camp and boat. Each state park is noted to be a
significant part of the fabric of Arkansas. State parks have impacted and enhanced the quality of life
for Arkansans locally and have served visitors from around the world. Being one of the state’s largest
economic drivers for the state, the Arkansas State Park system has added more than $1 billion each
year to the state’s economy and welcomed over eight million guests into state parks and museums.
In 2023, the state celebrated 100 years of Outdoor Recreation and launched the Natural State
Initiative (NSI) which strives to further establish Arkansas as a leader in the outdoor economy and a
destination for outdoor enthusiasts around the world to ensure the NSI reaches its full potential
through increasing park revenue.
With this initiative, Arkansas aims to be a true leader in the outdoor recreation industry by investing
in the outdoor workforce to improve amenities at state parks by partnering with local businesses to
offer quality food and beverage, including alcohol sales, at higher-visitation state parks. They will
explore new service vendor opportunities and add new experiences at parks to enhance visitor
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 7
appeal. New tax incentives and opportunity zones will be examined to attract outdoor entrepreneurs
and businesses to the state. Below is a list of planned projects for the four NSI Opportunity Zone
Parks based on PHT’s estimates:
Petit Jean State Park
• Boathouse Dock Replacement ($150,000)
• Renovation of Campground C&D ($4 million)
• New Campground ($4 million)
• Playground Replacement ($1 million)
• Various Paving ($500,000)
Pinnacle Mountain State Park
• Trail Improvements Park-Wide ($1m)
• Repaving of West Summit Day-Use Parking Lot ($350,000)
Queen Wilhelmina State Park
• WTP Renovation ($300,000)
• Campground Improvements, ($2.5 million)
• Day-Use Improvements ($350,000)
• Day-Use Playground Replacement ($200,000)
• Equipment Shed ($175,000)
• Various Paving ($500,000)
Delta Heritage Trail State Park
• Phase IX: Snow Lake to Mozart ($10.5m)
• Phase X: Benzal Bridge ($18.6m)
• Phase XI: White River to Arkansas River ($6.5m)
PHT will continue to explore and secure additional funding opportunities to enhance service delivery
for state park visitors. For example, the bullets below identify the current state and areas of
opportunity for four state parks:
Pinnacle Mountain State Park:
• No lodging
• No full-scale restaurant
• One current concessionaire – Loblolly Ice Cream at the new Visitor Center
• Three properties are up for lease – the old visitor center, the Butterfield House, and the horse
barn
Petit Jean State Park:
• Lodging
• Restaurant
• Cabins
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 8
• Tent campsites
• Yurts
Delta Heritage Trail State Park:
• No lodging
• No full-scale restaurant
• Four properties up for lease
Queen Wilhelmina State Park:
• Lodging
• Full scale restaurant
• Tent campsites
PHT is seeking to identify new service opportunities with specialized businesses to create additional
experiences that complement each state park site to increase guest visits. In addition, technological
resources will need to be considered to better support administrative oversight, partner
accountability and data tracking to identify return on investment for projects, outcomes and
partnerships.
Rationale: The Parks Division has 670 FTEs and an operational budget of $56.9 million. Arkansas
State Parks aim to enhance the quality of life for visitors through exceptional outdoor experiences,
connections to Arkansas heritage and sound resource management. PHT’s goal is for visitors to
experience excellent hospitality and to form a personal connection to the parks.
PHT is seeking to shift their service delivery offerings through PPP partnerships to improve the state
park experience for visitors. As state parks cannot offer extensive services beyond their immediate
resources, there is an interest in expanding service potential through PPP. As specialty businesses
already exist, consideration is being given for partnership opportunities that will complement and
enhance state park structures like food and beverage contracts, kayak/boating rental, E-bikes, EV
Charging, and guided hiking excursions. In addition, State Opportunity Zones are being considered
as they offer several investments like tax benefits, tourism development incentives and state
conformity to federal incentives to attract businesses and spur economic development in
economically distressed areas.
Implementation Considerations: There is interest for PHT to collaborate with Arkansas
businesses and offer new service delivery arrays for state park visitors. Arkansas may consider the
following factors in assessing Public-Private Partnerships:1
• Prioritization of partnership agreements where business vendors will provide services within
state park units with minimal involvement and oversight by department staff.
• Contemplation of co-management opportunities where business vendors operate a portion
of a park unit while sharing operational, financial roles, and accountability for the park unit
with the individual state parks (if allowed and appropriate).
1
Parks California: "Creating Impact: A Study of NonProfit Partnership in California State
Parks," https://parkscalifornia.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/NonprofitPartnershipStudy.pdf
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 9
• Prospects for business vendors to secure partnerships beyond local state park contracts if
their business bandwidth can support serving multiple park locations or statewide
operations.
• Utilization of non-profit charitable organizations dedicated to enhancing education and
interpretive programs to offer and fund critical staff positions, exhibits, visitor center
development, outdoor recreational programs, special events and other potential projects
new to the state.
• Assurance that vendor partnerships include alignment of business practices that best
support and further the NSI.
• High quality outdoor recreation experiences through vendor products, services or funding
that offsets operational and maintenance costs of visitor services.
• Validations that businesses selected for the PPP are safe and support the PHT brand
position.
• Need to promote the new opportunities clearly on the website to promote public awareness
and visit planning.
Other states have demonstrated creativity to execute public private partnerships within state parks
and service delivery industries. They share guidance and lessons learned from their experience such
as:
• Ohio: Focused on the funding pressures and funding declines from state government fiscal
challenges, they shed light on the importance of re-evaluating traditional practices to fund
and operate state parks. They note that embracing a PPP allows for state parks to raise
revenue through non-traditional opportunities. 2
• California: California’s Partnership Division’s mission is to support park operations and
empower, inspire and strengthen public and private partners to create, promote, sustain,
and expand visitor services to its diverse population of visitors. They state system of
partnerships engages high performing private, public and volunteer services to provide
recreation benefits to visitors while protecting and preserving natural and cultural resources
aligned with the Departments mission. Their website3 offers insight into the purpose of
their Concessions Program that partners with private and public-sector entities for
assistance to provide quality services, programs and facilities that enhance convenience,
enjoyment, education, and recreational experiences for State Park Visitors. It also includes
an overview as to how non-profit organizations can enhance the Department’s services to
park visitors with policies and guidelines. There is an invitation for individuals,
organizations, corporations, partners and volunteers to contribute to funding park services
and units. The operation and co-management of parks section provides access to annual
reports4 for concessions and nonprofit operations.5
2
Reason and Buckeye Institute, “Parks 2.0: Operating State Parks Through Public-Private Partnerships”, 2013,
ps419parks-buckeye-txt (buckeyeinstitute.org)
3
California State Parks, “Partnerships”, 2024, PARTNERSHIPS (ca.gov)
4
California State Parks, “Concessions Annual Reports”, 2024, Annual Reports (ca.gov)
5
Parks California.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 10
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
In some instances, when PPP are utilized for service delivery industries, misalignment of business
priorities can surface between partners. To mitigate misalignment and conflicting priorities,
transparency must occur on the onset of the partnership. Frameworks defining clear and realistic
guidelines, roles, responsibilities, accountability oversight and partnership benefits should be
mutually developed and agreed upon before program execution. Utilizing periodic checkpoints is
recommended to promote active dialogue from both parties. PHT should incorporate frequent
evaluation of the partnership to ensure the partnership is delivering expected program outcomes
or if improvements need to be made to change course.
Understanding the level of interest and demand from the community is essential to identifying and
evaluating new PPP opportunities. Community engagement can help provide PHT insight to foresee
and resolve potential obstacles before key project decisions are made. Engaging community
stakeholders will also help minimize misconceptions that may surface from external parties not
involved in the PPP process. Proactive efforts to create a standardized communication strategy to
explain the value of the PPP partnership to the community, partners, stakeholders, and the state is
critical. World Bank Organization6 provides guidance for incorporating widely accepted principles to
maximize the benefits of community engagement during the PPP process. Figure 4 provides
considerations for Contracting Authorities (CA).
6
International Finance Corporation, “A Guide to Community Engagement for Public-Private Partnerships.
Draft for Discussion,” 2019, A Guide to Community Engagement for Public-Private Partnerships - Draft Discussion June
2019.pdf (worldbank.org)
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 11
Figure 4 – Contracting Authority Considerations in Forming PPP
Reprinted from Source: International Finance Corporation, “A Guide to Community Engagement for Public-
Private Partnerships. Draft for Discussion,” 2019, A Guide to Community Engagement for Public-Private
Partnerships - Draft Discussion June 2019.pdf (worldbank.org).
Successful change management is needed to support the success of any PPP. Parks have previously
been operated exclusively by the State of Arkansas and there could be internal resistance or concern
from staff that their job is at risk. It will be critical for PHT to create support from staff early in the
process. PHT could do this by engaging staff to share their feedback and incorporating their
suggestions that align with project goals, acknowledging that state park staff are the ones who
interact with state park visitors daily. Transparency must be communicated as to how the new
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 12
processes will increase state park visitation by enhancing the volume of services being delivered to
attract more visitors. Providing standardized messaging for staff to adopt when they speak or are
asked about the change and clarifying expectations on how the current workforce can support the
new partnerships are essential to promote cohesiveness. All communication messaging (verbal,
formal, visual, mass, and written) should align with communication plan.
Steps for establishing PPP in Arkansas state parks (future state):
• The Office of Outdoor Recreation (OOR) will work with State Parks on the concessionaire
opportunities and ensure alignment on objectives for PHT and NSI. State Parks will identify
the properties available and will pull in the OOR to help find and engage with
concessionaires. The current team within State Parks will oversee the agreements in
collaboration with OOR.
• Identifying PPPs: Cross reference PHT offerings and available service delivery options with local
Arkansas businesses to determine potential partnership possibilities that would increase visitor
interest and drive growth in state park experiences.
• Gathering community support: Engage with key stakeholders from both public and private
sectors to gather input, build support and drive action for local, regional and statewide
partnerships.
• Establishing guidelines: Develop a transparent framework and standardized guidelines for
establishing, managing and supporting PPP. This process will include role definitions,
responsibility and accountability expectations and benefit insights for the partnerships
secured. PHT may want to implement an Issue Tracker to identify issues and track through
to resolution.
• Creating a proof of concept: Create and implement a pilot program to test selected
partnerships in focused locales and business industries.
• Evaluating the value of a pilot initiative: As the pilot is implemented, it is critical for PHT to
clearly define, understand and ensure that all efforts stay within project scope to achieve
success. PHT will need to evaluate progress and analyze outcomes. Identify, dashboards
like who and what is being measured? Milestones like what achievements are being sought
and within what time frame? and Finish line documentation detailing the progress through
project completion.
• Refining partnerships to expand opportunities: Partnership frameworks will be evaluated and
refined based on pilot outcomes for program expansion statewide. Circle back to the
planning process – Did the project achieve all goals defined? Evaluate performance
measures – Do the outcomes demonstrate the project end status? What about the lessons
learned – Document lessons learned throughout this process and apply going forward.
• Enhancing the PPP experience to sustain long term program success: Promote the
expansion launch of PPP partnerships across Parks and Heritage divisions. Identify and
provide the administrative support and resources needed for long term sustainability of
partnerships secured.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative aligns
with the State’s goal to further position Arkansas as a leader in the outdoor economy by investing in
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 13
the outdoor workforce and adding new experiences to enhance state parks. Finding effective,
excellent private partners that can augment the services delivered by the state
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
This initiative will require consistent communication to engage all parties and ensure everyone is
operating under the same expectations for success. As each state park and heritage center owns
their own property, they each have their own operations flow and understanding of their individual
business and offerings. It is not common practice for state parks to communicate changes and offer
updates consistently as they facilitate their own communication channels independently. Each
entity may execute their own information individually without engagement of the PHT office. While
leadership meetings occur bi-weekly between PHT and the state parks, there is no requirement to
include communication updates within these forums. PHT should initiate a new process to ensure
proactive scheduling of gatherings or inclusion of an agenda item in standing meetings for leadership
to review updates, encourage active dialogue, and identify changes, as applicable.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: This initiative is
expected to increase service delivery offerings and experiences at state parks through PPP.
Performance measures to be tracked:
• Number of sharing agreements executed for PPPs (expected to increase);
• Revenue changes resulting from PPP shared agreements (expected to increase);
• State Park visitation (expected to increase); and,
• Service utilization for PPP service delivery offerings (expected to increase).
Expected outcomes:
• Increased complementary revenue in parks where PPP are established
• Increased utilization of park buildings and land resources (e.g. use of empty buildings)
• Total amount from offset loss in operations (e.g. utilities, upkeep of empty buildings)
• Improved visitor experience
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: The overall positive fiscal impact of this initiative could reach an estimated
$140,000/year in revenue generation. This initiative is not expected to result in significant state fiscal
impact (cost) to implement. Contracting and oversight can be accomplished with existing resources.
All costs will be taken on by the new partner organizations. As a result of the PPP, it is anticipated
that new offerings may drive additional visitors to parks, which could contribute positively to the
local economies.
Change Management Plan: Standardized communication and promotion across PHT, state
parks and heritage centers will be critical to increase awareness of offerings and obtain staff buy-in
within the impacted departments. Key activities and timing for communication plan are included in
Appendix A – PHT Work Plan and summarized below in Figure 5.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 14
Figure 5 – PHT-04 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Office of Outdoor ● Revenue opportunities will be ● Division Katherine Andrews
Recreation, PHT sought by leveraging new and meetings
Parks Division and existing partners to expand
PHT Heritage services and resources at
Division Heritage and Parks locations
● Invite engagement from
teams to offer
recommendations for
expanded services and
business vendor
opportunities
● Encourage vendor
opportunities that have
business bandwidth to
support serving multiple park
locations or statewide
operations.
● PPP partnerships must be
high quality outdoor
recreation experiences and
should offset operational and
maintenance costs of parks.
● Partnerships must also align
with business practices that
best support and further NSI.
● Local and ● Arkansas will aim to be a true ● Website update Katherine Andrews
Legislative leader in the outdoor ● Release of one and Team: Office of
Officials recreation industry by pager PPP Legislative &
● Public and investing in the outdoor opportunity with Intergovernmental
Private workforce to elevate state benefits and Affairs
Partner(s) parks to the next level. cost efficiency
Potentials ● We will explore new service ● Press release
vendor opportunities and add ● Local radio
new experiences at parks to ● Social Media
enhance visitor appeal for ● State Park
increased visitation. marketing
● New tax incentives and sources
opportunity zones will be
examined to attract outdoor
entrepreneurs and
businesses to the state.
● We invite interested
businesses who are in the
service delivery industry to
explore PPP opportunities
with us if they provide high
quality outdoor recreation
experiences that are safe and
support the PHT brand
position.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 15
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
● We will implement a PPP
recreational pilot to test
selected partnerships in
focused locales and business
industries and will seek to
expand the launch of
partnerships across Parks
and Heritage divisions.
● Key ● Engage key stakeholders and ● Town Hall Katherine Andrews
Stakeholders community partners from meetings and Office of Outdoor
● Community both public and private ● Community Recreation, PHT
Partners sectors to gather input, build Presentations Parks Division and
support and drive action for ● Website PHT Heritage Division
local, regional and statewide ● Social media
partnerships.
PHT-07: Centralize grant data across all divisions and standardize
grant management practices
This initiative creates a centralized repository of grants distributed from the Tourism, Parks, and
Heritage divisions to 1) better serve Arkansans by providing a 'single source of truth' (e.g., application
instructions, criteria for funding) for PHT grants and 2) reduce administrative burden of tracking grant
compliance (e.g., automated requests for supporting documents, automated flag of out of
compliance grantees).
Initiative Overview and Current State: Distribution of grant funding is a core function
performed across divisions at PHT to support local arts activities and events, cultural restoration
heritage sites, and creation and maintenance of parks and trails/recreation, among other activities.
PHT manages grants in a decentralized manner, with staff located within each division. Grant
management current state includes:
• Historically there has not been a centralized approach to grant awards and monitoring.
Divisions capture different metrics and have used different methods to oversee their grant
programs. There is no formalized method to share best practices across divisions and ensure
consistency in grant administration.
• There is no central repository of grant applications by disposition (awarded/not awarded),
though the department is now moving toward implementation of one solution (the Foundant
Grant Lifecycle Manager) and supporting departments in migrating their historical data into
that system. In the past, grant awards have been tracked within each division using different
systems.
The lack of a centralized approach to grants management has resulted in administrative challenges
for PHT and missed opportunities for potential grantees including:
• The Department cannot easily track total grant funding distributed, demographic
characteristics of grantees (by type of organization and location), and outcomes achieved.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 16
This creates administrative burden for staff in researching and responding to frequent
inquiries about past grant investments.
• The Department is missing an opportunity to demonstrate the impact of the State’s grants,
including reporting on the impact of its funding and partnerships (such as in annual reports
or impact statements).
• The Department is missing an opportunity to share more information about the grants
process on its website, such as the process and timeline for application for the various
funding sources available and a searchable list of past recipients, which could support
organizations in determining whether to apply for state grants.
Rationale: PHT-07 directs PHT to centralize grants data and grant management. The Department
seeks to transfer an existing position and have that person oversee the grant management process.
Locating the position in a shared services function within the organization will ensure service to each
division. Because division staff working on grants may have other duties, they will remain in their
divisions but report to the centralized team with a dotted line reporting structure.
The central team will oversee adoption of departmental policies and procedures and a standard
process for grants management. The central team will:
• Coordinate and monitor the department-wide implementation of grants, contracts, and/or
loan programs by overseeing funding procedures and developing goals and objectives;
• Facilitate process improvement among departmental grants staff;
• Develop policies and procedures for grant application, award, monitoring, and compliance
activities performed by division-based grant staff;
• Identify and disseminate best practices in grant administration and monitoring;
• Monitor departmental grants implementation to ensure compliance with institution policies,
laws, and regulations;
• Prepare summary reporting on departmental grants awarded, including financial reports,
negotiates funding sources, monitors disbursements and invoices involving granting and
contracting agencies, and allocates resources for programs; and,
• Collaborate with the tourism department to add resources to the website to support
potential grant applicants.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – PHT Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with PHT staff.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
This initiative creates a centralized grant function, while preserving the direct reporting relationship
of the division grants staff to their respective divisions. Although some education may be needed to
obtain support from division leaders, the anticipated friction from centralizing grants is low.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 17
The central grants team will need to closely collaborate with the division grants staff for this initiative
to be successful. Although the division staff reporting relationship will not be direct (dotted line),
providing teambuilding resources will support the collaboration with the central grants team.
Additionally, PHT has acquired a grants management software, Foundant. This software tool allows
PHT to securely manage grant funding activities and streamline the entire grantmaking process in an
easy-to-use, cloud-based grants management software. Foundant supports grant application
creation and processing, compliance monitoring, reporting and analytics, as well as budgeting and
fund tracking.
Recommended steps for establishing new organization structure (future state):
• Revise job description for grants coordinator (complete).
• Complete transfer of position to CFO organization, educating division leadership and grants
staff on new structure, reporting, and duties.
• Establish policy/standard operating procedure for PHT grant monitoring using the Foundant
grant management software.
• Develop/request vendor assistance in training all division grants staff on Foundant use.
• IT and division grants staff migrate existing grants data into Foundant.
• Develop standard reporting using Foundant.
• Conduct training of division staff as needed to support implementation of this procedure.
• Engage the Tourism department for updates to website to share information on grants
calendar and process, as well as searchable database of recipients.
• Create annual report/impact statement for PHT grants.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: PHT distributes
significant state funds to local entities. This initiative aims to improve the grants management
process through centralizing the function and implementing grants management software that will
improve all aspects of grant management including tracking and reporting on grant funding. This
initiative can be implemented by shifting existing staff into a centralized, shared services role.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
This initiative is expected to result in process changes in how PHT divisions manage the grant
application, award, and oversight processes. It is expected the organizational structure will support
sharing of divisional best practices and inform establishment of a consistent department-wide
process. This could result in improvements to grant applicants through uniform and streamlined
processes (e.g., use of common forms, improved reporting).
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The goal of implementing one repository for the department’s grant information means that PHT can
now easily report on a variety of outcomes related to its administration and oversight of grants
including:
• Number of applications by year, type, and location (expected to increase);
• Average duration of grant process (expected to decrease);
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 18
• Number of grants awarded, by year, type, and location; and,
• Number of grants achieving intended outcome, by type.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: This initiative is not expected to have a fiscal impact but is an enabling
factor in improving the efficiency of PHT’s grants programs.
Change Management Plan: Figure 6 summarizes high level communication tasks, that are
also included in Appendix A – PHT Work Plan.
Figure 6 – PHT-07 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
PHT Division Leaders ● PHT seeks to bring rigor to our ● Secretary
grant oversight process. Chief Fiscal Officer
● A new central approach to
grant management will be
implemented, led by a grants
coordinator to be located
within the office of the CFO.
● Existing division grants staff will
remain within your divisions
and continue to report to their
existing supervisors.
● Over the coming months, we
will be implementing improved
processes for grants oversight
with the input of your staff.
Impacted Grants Staff ● PHT seeks to bring rigor to our ● Team Chief Fiscal Officer
grant oversight process. meetings Division Leaders
● A new central approach to
grant management will be
implemented, led by a grants
coordinator to be located
within the office of the CFO.
● New grant management
software (Foundant), will
reduce laborious manual
tracking and improve
compliance and reporting.
● Existing division grants staff will
remain within your divisions
and continue to report to your
existing supervisor.
● However, you will now have the
added resource of the central
grants position and an
extended team of colleagues
working on grants across PHT.
● Over the coming months, we
will be implementing
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 19
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
improvements how we manage
grants, building resources for
potential grantees, and
migrating existing grants data
into the Foundant database.
● Your involvement in these
efforts will be crucial.
Public/Grant ● PHT has created resources to ● Website Communication Team
Applicants support potential grant ● Social Media
applicants.
● Our website includes new tools
such as a calendar of key dates
and an overview of the grants
application process, as well as
a searchable director of past
grantees.
PHT-09: Ensure consistent administration practices across divisions
This initiative is focused on adopting consistent processes across accounting, fixed assets, and
procurement across divisions to reduce processing time and improve budget management.
Initiative Overview and Current State:
Within PHT, the Chief Fiscal Officer (CFO) has responsibility for financial operations as a service that
is shared across divisions. While each division maintains its own financial group, PHT coordinates
to ensure that procurement, budgeting, and purchasing processes are aligned. Teamwork is critical,
with division directors collaborating closely with CFO. For purchasing requests, the purchasing
group operates under shared services, which reports to the CFO, while accounts payable (AP) teams
handle the processing of confirmed bill payments.
Overall, existing financial processes are established and reasonably streamlined now. However,
there are variances in the execution of financial practices across divisions due to lack of consistent
coordination and the impact of staff turnover. In situations where there is uncertainty about
procedures, staff members typically turn to the central office for guidance. Operational processes
vary by division.
There is a consensus that changes to PHT’s financial processes be necessary in the future,
especially as the department prepares for the implementation of the new S4HANA system (in
process of implementation to replace AASIS). S4HANA will offer automated workflows and digital
processes that can track work as it progresses through the system. As such, this initiative's focus is
primarily on standardizing financial practices among the three divisions.
Statewide policies regarding procurement remain consistent across all divisions with specific
procedural codes: Parks operates under code 0900, while Heritage adheres to code 0865. However,
a significant challenge arises from insufficient staffing at the Central Office, which is responsible for
finalizing all financial transactions. Any approval for expenditures exceeding $5,000 must come
from the central office before moving forward, often resulting in delays.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 20
Rationale: PHT-09 aims to standardize financial processes across its three divisions to enhance
efficiency, improve budget management, and facilitate better coordination. Currently, disparities in
financial practices and the challenges posed by staff turnover create inconsistencies that can hinder
effective operations. By adopting consistent procedures, the department seeks to minimize
administrative rework and streamline financial administration, ultimately preparing for the
upcoming transition to the new S4HANA system. This initiative is essential to align the financial
practices of the Parks, Heritage, and Tourism divisions.
The expected benefits of the initiative include:
• Improved Efficiency: Standardizing processes will reduce time spent on administrative tasks
and rework, leading to more efficient operations.
• Enhanced Coordination: A unified approach will facilitate better communication and
collaboration among the three divisions, reducing confusion and enhancing teamwork.
• Better Training and Onboarding: With consistent practices, new staff can be trained more
effectively, ensuring they are well-versed in the established procedures.
• Preparation for S4HANA Transition: By standardizing practices now, PHT will be better
positioned to implement the upcoming S4HANA system seamlessly.
• Increased Compliance: Adopting standardized processes ensures adherence to statewide
procurement policies and financial regulations, mitigating risks associated with non-
compliance.
Implementation Considerations:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
In a work session with PHT staff to plan for implementation of more standardized financial processes
(see Figure 7), barriers to the adoption of consistent processes were identified and are included in
Figure 7’s red boxes and the related solutions are identified in green boxes. In summary, some of the
primary challenges and strategies to address them include:
• Reluctance to change due to legacy practices: Change management will be needed to
ensure staff in all divisions, including those that operated independently as former
departments, adopt consistent departmental practices. Providing clear examples of how
standardization will streamline operations, reduce administrative workload, and improve
overall efficiency and demonstrating quick wins or initial successes from pilot programs
could help overcome resistance.
• Continued turnover of staff could delay implementation of consistent financial practices and
create knowledge gaps. With staff departing and new employees needing to be trained, the
process standardization may face interruptions, and maintaining consistency could be
difficult. Developing financial policies and procedures and training materials to support staff
onboarding can reduce this risk. A training library with detailed resources, guides, and
recorded sessions could ensure that new employees are brought up to speed quickly and
effectively.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 21
Figure 7 – PHT 09 Interference Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with PHT staff held on September 4, 2024.
Steps for Establishing the Future State:
• Analyze current processes: Review existing financial administration practices, identify gaps,
and gather requirements from all divisions. Onboard deputy director overseeing business
and operations.
• Create a unified framework: Develop a standardized process framework for accounting,
fixed assets, and procurement. Train deputy director on framework.
• Engage stakeholders: Hold workshops and meetings to align stakeholders and secure their
commitment to the new processes. Ensure 8 department directors within Heritage are
committed to enforcing change.
• Develop training sessions: Create and deliver training programs for employees on the new
standardized procedures.
• Implement software tools: Upgrade or implement necessary software tools to support the
standardized processes.
• Run pilot programs: Conduct pilot programs in select divisions, gather feedback, and make
necessary adjustments before full rollout.
• Roll out standardized processes: Implement the standardized processes across all divisions
while ensuring compliance.
• Define and adopt performance measures to assess impact.
• Monitor performance: Continuously track process performance, gather feedback, and make
improvements as necessary.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 22
Alignment of Department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative
requires minimal additional resources, as it focuses primarily on standardizing processes that
already exist across PHT divisions. The processes themselves are in place, so the primary effort will
involve aligning and coordinating them rather than creating new systems from scratch.
One key resource not directly attributed to this initiative, but still critical, is the new Deputy Director
position. The Deputy Director will play a pivotal role in ensuring compliance with the standardized
processes and aligning divisional practices. However, this role is being managed outside the scope
of the initiative and is therefore not listed or discussed as a dedicated resource here.
Another critical element of success is executive support. Leadership support will be crucial to
reinforce the need for standardization and ensure that staff across all divisions adhere to the unified
processes. With strong backing from leadership, the initiative will have the authority necessary to
maintain consistency and accountability in financial practices.
In summary, the resource requirements are minimal, focusing more on alignment and compliance,
with executive backing playing a key role in ensuring staff follow standardized procedures and
practices.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
The core change brought by this initiative is the standardization of financial processes across all PHT
divisions. Currently, Parks and Tourism are already aligned in their practices, but Heritage operates
differently. As a result of this initiative and greater standardization of processes, less variation from
the expected processes will occur, which may impact the Heritage division more than the others.
While some stakeholders believe that the procedures themselves are already largely aligned, there
is recognition that practices differ across divisions. These variations will need to be identified,
understood, and standardized to ensure that all divisions follow consistent financial practices. By
doing so, the department will reduce inconsistencies and streamline processes, making operations
more efficient and easier to manage across all divisions.
In summary, the initiative will result in a cohesive financial process across PHT, addressing
differences in practices while maintaining aligned procedures. This effort will enable the
department to operate more smoothly and reduce rework caused by current inconsistencies.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: These metrics
will provide a clear view of how well the standardization effort is working and its impact on efficiency,
speed, and compliance within the department.
• Time spent on administrative rework such as errors or incomplete documentation (expected
to decrease);
• Financial process completion time for tasks such as procurement/purchasing approvals and
budget reconciliations (expected to decrease); and,
• Compliance with standardized procedures (expected to increase).
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 23
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: The standardization of financial processes across PHT is expected to yield
several important savings, both tangible and intangible that include:
• Improved Budget Management (Planned vs. Actual): By aligning financial processes across
all divisions, the department will be better able to track and compare planned budgets
against actual expenditures. This will help reduce overspending, avoid budget
discrepancies, and allow for more accurate forecasting. Ultimately, this will lead to better
financial planning and a more efficient allocation of resources.
• Increased Accountability and Transparency: Standardized processes will enhance transparency
by ensuring all divisions follow the same financial procedures. This consistency will make it
easier to identify errors or inefficiencies, hold staff accountable for financial decisions, and
reduce the risk of mismanagement. The increased transparency will also streamline audits and
compliance reviews, which can result in reduced costs for corrective actions or fines.
Change Management Plan: In addition to the change management practices discussed
above, communication with impacted staff will be an important part of this initiative’s success. Key
communication tasks are included in Attachment A – PHT Workplan and included below in Figure
8.
Figure 8 – PHT-09 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
PHT financial staff • These changes are to strengthen Emails to staff CFO
our team through enacting
financial processes that are Lunch and learns
consistent across divisions.
• High level summary of changes.
PHT-14: Use data to improve guest experience
This initiative seeks to use customer experience data to inform PHT’s marketing and communication
strategies to drive more in- and out-of-state visitors to its parks and heritage sites.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Tourism Division is the promotional arm for the
department. They receive appropriations for advertising and marketing and oversee communication
channels including the website and social media. The Tourism Division strives to expand the
economic impact of travel and tourism in Arkansas including from out of state and intra-state travel.
The Division of Tourism (through an external agency partner and internal team) utilizes multiple
digital channels to promote PHT offerings, including:
• Websites: Arkansas.com (which received over 7.27 million page views from October 2023 -
October 2024) and ArkansasStateParks.com.
• Social Media: X, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, and Pinterest social media accounts. There
used to be separate pages for all welcome center locations and many parks. PHT is streamlining
social media pages.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 24
In addition to these digital offerings, the Tourism division manages 13 Arkansas Welcome Centers at
strategic points of entry to the state and employs more than sixty staff members statewide.
To inform its marketing efforts, the Division of Tourism uses multiple strategies:
• Research: The Division spends approximately $500,000 on research including visitor profile
data to inform development of messaging.
• Google Analytics: The Division uses Google Analytics to review website traffic and assess the
impact of its digital ads and search engine optimization.
• Adara: The Division tracks the effectiveness of its digital ads using this tool (e.g., did a
website visitor take an action such as booking a flight or hotel as a result of the visit to the
website).
The Division has currently begun a large project to revamp PHT’s website, given the importance of
this channel in reaching potential visitors. The Team recently contracted with a vendor (CJRW) and
launched the project in August 2024, with “Go Live” for the new site expected in late Summer 2025. The
project includes Arkansas.com and ArkansasStateParks.com as two primary domains. The project will
rebuild the site from the ground up and expand functionality to make it a tool for trip planning (itinerary
tools, connecting to hotels and park experiences), as well as removing out of date content.
While PHT has invested in driving visitors to PHT offerings, there needs to be better understanding of
the customer experience after visiting a park or heritage site. Access to this information could help
PHT’s divisions make program improvements to improve the guest experience and could also inform
Tourism’s approach to marketing PHT offerings. Some of these gaps in understanding include:
• Visitor satisfaction data from park and heritage sites is not captured electronically, with
insights not able to be used to inform Tourism’s strategies. There are paper surveys at the
various parks, but no formal mechanism to collect, analyze and report on this data.
• PHT does not have a formal program to review, respond to, and address negative online
reviews on platforms such as Google, TripAdvisor, and other tourism sites which are
impactful for customers. These platforms are significant sources of information for
potential visitors. Many customers will search for a destination (park or museum) online
before deciding to visit.
Google is currently the fastest-growing review platform, and therefore reviews on Google
have become more critical than ever. Reviews are a powerful tool to convince visitors to
spend time at an Arkansas park or museum. Three main reasons PHT may benefit from
increasing the number of reviews on Google include:7
• Reviews improve ranking on Google search, increasing likelihood that someone
views PHT’s information.
• Reviews (positive and negative) are an important feedback loop for optimizing the
customer experience and provide a real-time view of customer experience.
7
“Google Reviews are Becoming More Reliable and More Important. Whether You Like It or Not,” April 2024,
mobal.io/blog-posts/google-reviews-are-becoming-more-reliable-and-more-important-whether-you-like-it- or-
not
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 25
• Reviews help to build trust and credibility. Positive reviews can lead to a potential
visitor visiting the PHT web page, search for more reviews, contact the business, or
visit the actual location. Significantly, 76% of reviewers trust online reviews as
recommendations from family and friends, which certainly positively influences
decisions.8
Anecdotally, a search for the Old State House Museum in Little Rock yielded a result of 678
reviews, with most being 5 stars and the average of all reviews 4.6.
Another source of reviews is Tripadvisor. To demonstrate the value of online reviews, a recent
study revealed the highest-rated state parks in the United States based on online reviews.
Travel experts at Niagara Falls Tours & Tickets conducted the study, which used Tripadvisor
data to determine the average rating visitors gave to each state park. The team only factored
in state parks with more than 50 online reviews.9 As seen in Figure 9, Moro Bay State Park in
Arkansas was among the top ten highly rated state parks.
Figure 9 – Top 10 Highest Rated State Parks on Tripadvisor
Percentage of
Average reviews that
Rank State Park City/Region Rating are 5 stars
1 California Humboldt Redwoods State Park Weott 4.884 90.30%
2 Alaska Kachemak Bay State Park Homer 4.882 89.70%
3 Oregon Shore Acres State Park Coos Bay 4.862 87.60%
4 Oregon Smith Rock State Park Redmond 4.855 87.00%
5 Virginia Grayson Highlands State Park Mouth of Wilson 4.853 88.20%
6 Hawaii Waimea Canyon State Park Waimea 4.844 86.60%
7 California Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park Crescent City 4.839 86.20%
8 Arkansas Moro Bay State Park Jersey 4.838 87.70%
9 Oregon Samuel H. Boardman State Scenic Corridor Brookings 4.833 84.10%
9 Michigan Ludington State Park Ludington 4.833 86.20%
10 West Virginia Beartown State Park Marlinton 4.832 85.70%
PHT could conduct a more complete analysis to capture and monitor the current Google and
Tripadvisor rating of Arkansas parks and heritage sites and to review the qualitative feedback
provided for improvement ideas.
Rationale: This initiative seeks to build on the data and guest communication channels PHT has
today, by more formally gathering customer experience data and addressing negative online
customer feedback. The Tourism division will support Parks and Heritage in implementing online
surveys to collect more customer experience data and conducting analysis of collected information.
In addition, the Communication Team will analyze online feedback obtained through Google,
Tripadvisor, and other platforms. Collectively, the Tourism division will support the synthesis of this
information into a dashboard for leadership and ensure input of this customer experience data is
available to leaders for use in identifying program improvements.
8
“Google Reviews are Becoming More Reliable and More Important. Whether You Like It or Not,” April 2024.
9
Jacqueline Tripp, Study reveals most highly-rated state parks in United States,” September 13, 2024,
https://www.ketk.com/news/study-reveals-most-highly-rated-state-parks-in-united-states/.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 26
Implementation Considerations:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
The Division of Tourism is the promotion arm for the department and has tools to analyze customer
experience (such as deploying online surveys) but lacks access to the customers who visit parks and
heritage sites. The Parks and Heritage divisions manage the locations where guests visit but do not
have the resources or tools to capture or analyze feedback today on a large scale. Collaboration
between the divisions is essential to the success of this initiative.
Recommended steps for using customer feedback to drive improvements (future state):
Division of Tourism will work with PHT division leadership to:
• Create a strategy to implement digital surveys and more customer-centric testing at parks
and heritage sites, leveraging the tools available to the Tourism division.
• Collect relevant data from feedback surveys, online reviews and travel/tourism sites,
visitation records, and website analytics and identify insights to improve customer
experience and marketing strategy.
• Conduct qualitative, quantitative, and analytical research (including tracking Google and
TripAdvisor reviews) to continuously optimize omnichannel customer experiences.
• Create ongoing dashboards and summary reports to provide leadership with visibility to
customer experience data.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative aligns
with the State’s goal to further position Arkansas as a leader in the outdoor economy. Deploying
effective marketing strategies and analyzing new survey and existing online feedback through
various platforms will increase opportunities for improvement.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
This initiative will enable collection of more data from users of PHT’s parks and heritage sites. This
feedback could result in changes in how PHT manages these assets.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
This initiative will provide consumers with up-to-date information on PHT offerings. Marketing
enhancements are expected to increase customer satisfaction due to improved awareness and access
to PHT resources. The customer experience should improve overall.
Performance Measures to be tracked:
● The number and methods of communication channels utilized for marketing. (expected to
increase)
● Volume of reach through each communication channel used. (expected to increase)
● State Park visitation. (expected to increase)
● Service utilization volumes per state park and PHT offerings accessed. (expected to
increase)
● Revenue changes resulting from the increase in visitation post marketing campaign.
(expected to increase)
● Number of “stars” for Google and Trip Advisor reviews (expected to increase or remain
constant)
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 27
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: This initiative is not expected to result in cost savings, but it is an enabling
initiative to improve overall digital marketing, which could increase the number of in- and out-of-
state visitors to the park. Existing staffing and resources will be utilized.
Change Management Plan: PHT already utilizes a variety of digital channels to promote its
offerings. The opportunities identified in this initiative are narrow: to focus on obtaining additional
feedback from users of the parks and heritage sites, and to monitor and address online feedback
about PHT offerings through sites like Google and Tripadvisor. These are focused projects and it is
not anticipated they will require significant change management or necessitate a communication
plan.
PHT-15: Establish customer service training
This initiative seeks to disseminate hospitality best practices for PHT guest-facing employees, and
upskilling experience focused roles (e.g., park interpreters, museum educators) to improve the
guest experience.
By establishing department-wide customer experience best practices, performance standards and
training all the guest-facing PHT employees on these expectations, it will reinforce the organization’s
culture change into a more customer-focused organization and encourage high quality customer
service outcomes. This initiative is intended to be a “quick win” with action steps scheduled for
completion within weeks and total time to be deployed over a period of approximately six months.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Last year, the state parks in Arkansas received 9
million visitors. Tourism to state parks and heritage sites represent a significant driver of economic
activity. PHT leadership report their staff employed in the museums and parks around the state
generally offer good customer service and complaints are minimal. The parks and museums employ
similar types of guest-facing positions that offer key touch points during their visits. Parks and
museums have front-desk, lodge, or visitor center employees that interact with guests during the
initial stage of the guest experience. Museums employ education directors and parks employ park
interpreters that offer tours and education experiences. The parks also employ park rangers that are
responsible for law enforcement.
Leadership has established the goal of elevating the guest experience to make Arkansas a
destination. Leadership believes, while customer service and overall experience is strong, elevating
the customer experience is a major priority for PHT. Although complaints were minimal, leadership
admits the lack of data collection and survey tools makes it difficult to quantify the real guest
experience. Additionally, PHT employees are not offered or expected to complete any formal
customer service training.
Access to PHT data on customer experience and satisfaction at the parks and museums is limited
to anecdotal stories and limited feedback from overnight guests that stay in the state parks. The
state parks do not charge an entrance fee to any of their parks and there is no requirement to “check
in,” and this could present a challenge to implementing customer feedback. Customer feedback and
survey data is a rich source of potential process improvement and lack of this data can make it
challenging for leaders to identify issues and correct them. Customer service is “everyone’s job” but
it is not measured or reinforced through staff training, among other methods.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 28
Rationale: PHT-15 seeks to reinforce PHT’s culture of customer service and experience by
establishing customer service expectations and hospitality best practices for the organization and
training staff on these expectations. Investment in customer service skills for staff can have a
positive impact not only on the customers served but also result in improved job performance, and
ultimately more visitors to the parks and heritage sites.
State and federal agencies have sought to model customer experience initiatives on similar
initiatives in the private sector by establishing performance standards. In a recent study conducted
by Qualtrics, residents of Alaska, South Dakota, Florida, Maryland and New Hampshire made up the
top five states with the highest overall customer satisfaction of government services delivered by
their state. Missouri, Mississippi, Hawaii, Connecticut, and Illinois round out the bottom five states.
Arkansas was ranked 29th of 51 states (see Figure 10). Qualtrics asked nearly 20,000 people who
have recently used at least one of nine state and federal government services about their experience,
creating a new benchmark for customer experience across a range of state and federal services.10
The data for the report comes from a study of state and federal government customers that have used
at least one of several services from December 2023 through January 2024. Qualtrics Government
conducted this research by sampling 14,605 state customers and 4,985 federal customers.
Respondents represent all 50 states and the District of Columbia, with minimum sample size
thresholds to ensure state-by-state comparisons. Analysis included weighting at the regional level to
ensure adequate representation of demographic groups.11
10
Qualtrics, These Governments Offer the Best Customer Service, May 23, 2024, Qualtrics.com.news/these-
state-governments-offer-the-best-customer-service/
11
Qualtrics, These Governments Offer the Best Customer Service, May 23, 2024, Qualtrics.com.news/these-
state-governments-offer-the-best-customer-service/
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 29
Figure 10 – State and Federal Government Customer Service Rankings 2024
Source: Reprinted from Qualtrics
Across the country, federal government services like Medicare, the USPS, and Social Security had the
highest overall satisfaction ratings while state government delivered services like the Division of Motor
Vehicles, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and state tax services scored the lowest. Although
the benchmark services did not include the type of services offered by PHT, the results set the boundaries
for state-to-state comparison.
The study suggested that the “top-performing government agencies utilize customer insights to
pinpoint crucial customer needs, wants, and desires, and invest in cross-channel improvements
that not only meet but exceed their expectations…The state services that are leading the way have
undertaken the important work of listening to their customers through a variety of structured and
unstructured channels to identify the most effective ways to make government easier to work with,
the holy grail for customer satisfaction.”12
Another finding from the study showed satisfaction did not vary between in-person and online
service experiences, but a strong bias existed when someone had to interact with both an online and
in-person experience. The longer a person interacted to resolve an issue and had to go back and
forth between online and in-person, decreased their satisfaction scores.
12
Qualtrics, These Governments Offer the Best Customer Service, May 23, 2024, Qualtrics.com.news/these-
state-governments-offer-the-best-customer-service/
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 30
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – PHT Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews and work sessions with PHT staff and review of other organizations and state best
practices include:
1. The State of Rhode Island requires all employees who interact with internal or external
customers to complete their Customer Service Academy. The required sequence of study
includes13:
• Amica customer service model
• Meeting the challenge of a difficult customer
• Managing customer expectations
• Building customer satisfaction
• Valuing differences
2. The Tennessee Department of Children’s Services implemented a GREAT Service (Greet,
Relate, Exceed, Affirm, Thank) curriculum for employees developed by the State Department
of Human Services, Strategic Learning Solutions division.
3. To improve the customer experience South Carolina Parks and Recreation implemented
annual customer service awards for their staff in a variety of categories. South Carolina
offers gift cards for rental of cabins, campsites, picnic shelters, meeting facilities, and
purchasing retail at state parks to promote their state parks. South Carolina also adopted
the Malcolm Baldridge quality criteria as a management system (Baldridge has a strong
customer service requirement) and implemented a dashboard of performance metrics
tracking the outcomes of agency priorities.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
This initiative offers an opportunity to build a culture of customer service at PHT. However, this
requires follow-through to make customer service skills part of the culture and values and ongoing
change management. If conducted as a one-time training exercise, staff will not adopt and exhibit
these behaviors permanently. However, if display of these skills and adoption of these values truly
becomes part of how PHT does business, the department will realize the greatest value.
In addition to training, PHT should take advantage of online reviews, which are widely used across
the hospitality industry. See discussion in PHT-14 regarding use of Google, Tripadvisor, and other
online tools to obtain real-time feedback about customer experience and customer service
opportunities.
13
hr.ri.gov/learning/academies/documents/
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 31
Recommended steps to implement customer-centered training (future state):
• Develop comprehensive training materials and guidelines based on identified best practices.
If training is not developed internally, training can be purchased to reinforce these values.
There are many “off the shelf” customer service tools and curricula that may be purchased.
PHT could adopt a “Train the Trainer” model to contain costs.
• Form a customer service workgroup, with representation from all business areas and levels
of the organization, to include Transformation and Shared Services (TSS). TSS offers an in-person
Communications and Customer Service training that could be reviewed for applicability to
hospitality best practices. If it does not apply, PHT could work with TSS to customize it to their
needs or develop its own curriculum.
• Conduct training sessions (e.g., hospitality 101) for all guest-facing employees to ensure
understanding and implementation of best practices.
• Upskill experience-focused roles (e.g., state park interpreters, museum program assistants,
superintendents) through specialized workshops and training programs.
• Implement a mentorship program where experienced employees can guide and support
newer staff in applying best practices.
• Monitor and evaluate the impact of training on guest experience through feedback surveys
(e.g., visitor surveys, customer sentiment analysis across online reviews) and performance
metrics.
• Continuously update training materials and practices based on feedback and evolving
industry standards.
• Create a comprehensive strategy to reinforce these new customer service values:
o Create ongoing email / staff intranet content about the values and skills
o Create messages from PHT leadership reinforcing the values
o Create a staff recognition program for excellent customer service
• Establish department and division goals for customer service performance.
• Create mechanisms to collect real-time feedback at state parks and heritage sites (iPad
kiosks, QR codes that take user to an online survey, and outbound surveys via phone or text
if customer data can be collected) (see PHT-14 about customer service opportunities).
• Create a scorecard to use in sharing relevant metrics with staff. This could be a monthly or
quarterly scorecard.
Customer service training programs are courses or certifications that equip employees with the
skills, knowledge, and techniques to enhance customer satisfaction. The skills learned from these
training programs help employees find solutions, answer questions, and communicate better with
clients. There are many examples of curricula for public and private entities that seek to improve soft
skills and customer service training. There is a plethora of vendors who have developed products at
various price points (e.g., Alliance Training and Consulting, ICMA, Human Resources Institute,
etc.).14
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: Customer
experience is among the department’s highest priorities and a focus of not only Arkansas Forward,
but other initiatives as well. While the department views customer service as everyone’s job, this
initiative seeks to operationalize this goal.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 32
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: This initiative directly is not expected to change processes, but depending on how leaders
seek to integrate these values and behaviors into their work, future process improvement could
occur.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: A range of costs could be
incurred depending on how PHT seeks to deploy this training and collect customer feedback.
Development of training to communicate desired customer service behaviors to the staff can be
done within existing resources, a curriculum could be purchased, training seminars could be
facilitated by a leader, or PHT could partner with TSS to use an already developed curriculum.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to improve customer service across customer-facing functions at PHT.
Metrics that could be used to measure this success include:
• Percentage of guest-facing staff completing customer service training (goal is 100%);
• Annual same-guest visits to lodge, cabins, and food and beverage experiences (expected to
increase);
• Number of visits to museums (expected to increase);
• Number of visits to state parks (expected to increase);
• Customer experience / satisfaction rate (survey results) (expected to increase);
• Net Promoter Score – This asks the question would you recommend PHT museums or state
parks to your friends and family? The question could be incorporated into the survey post-
transaction with PHT and captured in a variety of methods (as a verbal question at the end of a
call, a text or email-based survey, or on kiosks in the lodges or visitor centers) (expected to
increase).
14
Alliance, “Meeting Customer Service Challenges in the Public Sector,” https://alliancetac.com/customer-
service-training/onsite-course/meeting-customer-service-challenges-in-the-public-sector-course-outline
Human Resources Institute, “Customer Services Skills for Government Employees,”
https://www.federaltraining.com/courses/professional_development/Customer_Service_Skills_training.asp
x ICMA, “Outstanding Local Government Customer Service,”
https://shop.learninglab.icma.org/products/9973492-flg_olgcs.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 33
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: This initiative is not anticipated to result in direct cost savings. PHT could
incur a nominal cost to purchase or develop training, but these costs could be reduced if PHT uses
a “Train the Trainer” approach or the existing TSS Communications and Customer Service training.
Increased visits to the museums and state parks could increase revenue for the state.
Change Management Plan: Once PHT defines its customer service objectives and goals, and
trains the team accordingly, additional reinforcement will be necessary to achieve the intended
outcomes. There are many low or no-cost methods PHT can use to integrate its customer service
goals into its culture and operations, such as:
• Creating a dashboard to measure performance related to the values and using this
dashboard in management meetings on a persistent and ongoing basis with staff
• Recognizing teams or individual staff members who exhibit extraordinary customer service
While no single action can achieve a culture change, taken together, these examples illustrate how
organizations can make their values “come alive” and remain relevant for the staff.
Key communication tasks are included in Attachment A – PHT Work Plan and summarized in Figure
11.
Figure 11 – PHT-15 Communication Plan
Audience(s) Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
All Staff • PHT is adopting new hospitality best practices • All staff emails
and customer service values • Town halls
• Improving customer experience is our goal • Intranet
• Customer service is everyone’s responsibility • Face-to-face meetings
• These values were identified by a team of staff
• We are going to provide tools and training to
reinforce these values and skills
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 34
PHT-19: Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business
critical/duplicative applications across all divisions of PHT
This initiative directs the Department of Parks, Heritage, and Tourism (PHT) to coordinate
identification and retirement of non-business critical or duplicative applications across all
departments. This initiative can be accomplished in a phased approach, including to conduct:
• Initial assessment to gather application data and walk through assessment criteria (e.g.,
business criticality);
• Identify and finalize candidate applications;
• Sunset plan and timeline for each application; and,
• Track value capture with the Department of Transformation and Shared Services (TSS) (e.g.,
reduction or reinvestment of contract hours).
Initiative Overview and Current State: Today PHT maintains over 20 software applications,
with an annual budget of over $170,000 (the amount has varied based on the maintenance and new
development required in a given year), summarized in Figure 12.
Figure 12 – Current PHT Software Applications 2024
Cost
Budget Licenses MSA
Software Use Case Vendor (Rounded) Allocation Seats Candidate
Food and
Beverage Mgmt. F&B
Aloha System Management $19,485 100% Parks 6 Sites Yes
44% Shared
Services,
Agency 44% State
Commissioner Parks, 12%
Box.com File Sharing Box.com $3,000 Tourism 9 Yes
Dameware
Remote Support 100%
and Remote MIS Remote Shared
Everwhere Mgmt. Dameware $5,000 Services 7 No
33% State
GIS Mapping Parks, 67%
ArcGIS Software ESRI $15,500 Heritage 20 Yes
AutoCAD Design/CAD TD Synnex $15,736 100% Parks 6 Yes
100%
Shared
Carbonite Data Backups SHI $39,800 Services 1000 Yes
22% Shared
Services,
54%
Heritage,
Adobe Creative PDF Application, 24% State
Cloud Design Studio SHI $58,515 Parks 146 Yes
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 35
Cost
Budget Licenses MSA
Software Use Case Vendor (Rounded) Allocation Seats Candidate
100%
HR - Training Shared
Sphera Registration SHI $2,500 Services 1 Yes
36% State
Parks, 64%
PastPerfect PastPerfect $8,500 Heritage 19 Sites Yes
100%
MIS - Imaging Shared
PDQ Software SHI $3,000 Services 1 No
Keep Arkansas 100% Keep Based on
Beautiful - Data AR website
Tableau Analytics Carasoft $840 Beautiful views Yes
Law Enforcement
- Incident
Management 100% State
iSOMS System SHI $73,130 Parks 1 Yes
50% Parks
Grant 50%
Foundant Management Foundant Heritage 2 Yes
100%
Shared
Barcloud Asset Manager SHI Services 3 Yes
100%
Alchemer Survey Software SHI $4,054 Tourism 2 Yes
100%
Shared
Laserfiche Digital Forms SHI $13,048 Services 3 Yes
100%
Mapline Mapping Software Mapline $9,554 Heritage 5 Yes
60%
Agency Tourism,
Workflow/Project 40%
Mgmt. Communicat
Monday.com Application SHI $14,516 ions 25 Yes
Agency Web Network 100% State
Domain Hosting Domain Registrar Solutions $1,4412 Parks Yes
17%
Heritage,
11%
Tourism,
17% Shared
Services,
55% State
Verizon Mobile Agency Phones Verizon $111,000 Parks Yes
40% State
Parks, 60%
AT&T Mobile Agency Phones AT&T $20,280 Heritage Yes
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 36
Since the 2019 consolidation, PHT’s IT leadership has focused on several priorities:
• Migrating many of its applications from on premises to cloud-based;
• Identifying opportunities to consolidate division use of software rather than have divisions
using different solutions for similar purposes. Examples include: Foundant for managing
grant funds, ARC GIS for geographic information system (GIS) software; and,
• Consolidating and managing software as a service (SAS) subscription so that PHT is paying
only for users that are active. PHT wants to take advantage of favorable pricing by using a
Master Services Agreement (MSA) model that aggregates users across the divisions and
consolidates pricing under an MSA instead of contracting with each division independently.
PHT IT leadership is actively conducting an agency-wide inventory of all software assets and planning
for consolidation under MSAs. IT Leadership is working to put a process in place to actively manage
all software assets. To achieve this goal, IT leadership intends to review and select an asset
management software. This software will enable PHT to inventory, track, and manage all software
licenses and agreements. This asset management software will have a built-in workflow to alert staff
to the upcoming expiration of software licenses so that they can proactively renegotiate contracts
and potentially improve pricing. The software will also enable IT management to keep a close watch
on all per seat charges to ensure that each paid for seat is actively needed by an employee and to
leverage seat allocations across divisions.
Rationale: PHT-19 directs PHT to develop a strategy for the actively inventorying and managing
software applications across the PHT divisions. This includes:
• Moving applications from on premises to cloud based to increase efficiency and save cost.
• Inventorying software assets and maximizing MSA agreements for favorable pricing.
• Developing an asset management process that tracks per seat license fees to ensure each
fee is warranted and tracks expiration dates to maximize favorable pricing.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A – PHT Work Plan provides the action steps in the recommended sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through
interviews with PHT staff include:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
Integration challenges include merging contracts and optimizing per seat licensing fees. When
pursuing merging divisions under one MSA agreement, IT management must take into account paid
through dates. For example, if a division has recently paid for a license through a 12-month period,
PHT would want to wait until the end of the 12-month period before folding that division into the MSA.
IT management should investigate and develop a catalog of all current contracts, expiration dates,
number of users, and paid through dates to optimize the use of MSA and SAS agreements. Careful
stewardship of current inventory will enable IT management to make the best use of state funds.
Recommended steps for replacing and retiring PHT legacy systems (future state):
• Collaborate with the Division of Information Systems (DIS) to inventory all IT applications
currently in use across the department. (Complete)
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 37
• Assess feasibility and cost benefit of moving software from on-premises to cloud-based
support. Move applications to cloud-based.
• Where appropriate, consolidate contracts under an MSA to obtain favorable pricing
• Conduct a cost-benefit analysis of replacing identified applications with chosen
alternatives, including potential savings and the impact of change on current operations.
• Present streamlined applications plan to Secretary Lewis for feedback and approval.
• Negotiate any contracts with software vendors for the new solutions, ensuring favorable
terms and compliance with state procurement guidelines.
• Research and implement an asset management software solution that enables IT staff to
closely monitor per seat usage and track license expiration dates to ensure favorable pricing.
• Plan and execute the transition from the old applications to the new, including data
migration, system configuration, and integration with existing IT infrastructure.
• Develop and implement a training program for all affected staff to ensure smooth adaptation
to new applications - establish change management.
• Conduct a comprehensive review session with the DIS team to assess the implementation
success and gather feedback on the process and outcomes – make any necessary
adjustments based on feedback.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: The IT audit team is
evaluating the current application landscape and usage patterns. They are recommending the
procurement of a software asset management software that would provide staff with workflow and
the ability to track and monitor all software assets. Automated alerts when license/contract dates
are expiring, will help IT managers proactively seek the best pricing when renewing contracts.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
IT management wants to develop a software asset management process that allows active
monitoring of all assets. They should take advantage of process mapping sessions to map the
process prior and use the process map when procuring the software asset management tool to
ensure the tool is aligned with the desired PHT process.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
• Annual IT spending (expected to decrease by optimizing software licenses and maintenance
costs);
• Contracts consolidated (expected to increase number of MSAs and decrease number of
individual contracts/licenses);
• Number of per seat fees (expected to decrease as seats are allocated across divisions and
seats are closely monitored to ensure active use); and,
• Number of applications running on premises (expected to decrease as applications move to
cloud).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: As PHT consolidates and closely manages their IT assets, the department
should see a decrease in overall IT spending. There is a cost associated with the purchase of a
software asset management tool, but the increased efficiency in tracking fees and driving better
pricing through MSAs will produce a savings that can off-set that cost.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 38
Change Management Plan: PHT has an opportunity to promote this initiative as a “win” for
the department to consolidate IT applications across divisions and generate savings for the
department. Figure 13 summarizes some of the key activities for the communication plan; more
detail is included in Appendix A – PHT Work Plan.
Figure 13 – PHT-19 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
All Staff ● PHT is embarking on a project to modernize Staff emails Communication
its applications, with the goal to improve Team
efficiencies for staff and the public.
● This investment will help PHT better fulfill its
mission and truly integrate all our divisions
under one agency.
● Each per seat user will be evaluated and you
can do your part by informing your manager
if you are assigned a software application
that you don’t need or use.
PHT Strategic Management Plan Final 11/4/2024 39
Strategic Management Plan:
Arkansas Department of Corrections
Table of Contents
Overview .................................................................................................................1
Recommended Organizational Structure...................................................................2
How this Department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective future department............3
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward Implementation ................................4
DOC-01: Improve the purchasing process at DOC .....................................................................4
DOC-02: Enhance payment efficiency by streamlining online portal transactions and money
order processes .....................................................................................................................12
DOC-03: Leverage training services across DOC divisions ........................................................16
DOC-04: Revise leadership training program ...........................................................................21
DOC-05: Improve IT centralization to meet DOC needs ............................................................28
DOC-07: Identify improvements in inter-departmental collaboration to increase utilization of
available community resources and programs .........................................................................32
DOC-08: Improve data quality and processes ..........................................................................36
Overview
The Arkansas Department of Corrections (DOC) is committed to public safety and providing
evidence-based rehabilitative initiatives for offenders. The department includes multiple shared
services and two major programmatic divisions: the Division of Correction and the Division of
Community Correction. Other entities within the DOC are:
• Arkansas Sentencing Commission
• Post-Prison Transfer Board
• Arkansas Correctional School District
• Sex Offender Assessment Committee
• Arkansas State Council for the Interstate Commission for Adult Offender Supervision
Through the Arkansas Forward project, a 2024 initiative to improve the efficiency and effectiveness
of Arkansas’ 15 cabinet-level departments, DOC prioritized implementation of seven initiatives that
improve efficiency, while supporting staff and leadership with additional resources to be successful
(training, technology, and better access to data to drive decision-making).
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
This Strategic Management Plan (“Plan”) memorializes the work completed by DOC during Arkansas
Forward, translating the department’s vision into a plan consisting of recommended organizational
structure, key initiatives prioritized for immediate implementation, and related performance metrics.
A companion project plan (“Work Plan”) provides a more detailed resource to support
implementation of the initiatives by DOC’s Arkansas Forward project management team.
Recommended Organizational Structure
DOC’s current organization chart is shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1 – Current Organizational Structure*
*Current as of October 2024
Since consolidation in 2019, the Department’s primary focus has been to integrate its divisions into
one cohesive department. Because the divisions previously existed as independent departments,
they continue to operate autonomously. DOC has implemented a shared services model where
possible to improve efficiency (for information technology, human resources, finance, and
maintenance as examples), though these efforts have been impacted by DOC’s appropriations
structure (separate appropriations for the legacy departments). For example, while maintenance
staff are centralized, the budgets for maintenance at the Arkansas Division of Correction (ADC) and
Arkansas Community Correction (ACC) are separate. ADC has an unspent maintenance budget,
whereas ACC has greater maintenance needs than its resources will address. The department’s
ability to prioritize global maintenance needs is impacted by the budget structure. There are also
opportunities to reduce duplication through consolidation of shared resources. One example is
consolidating training academies described in initiative DOC-04.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
DOC continues to take steps to address the “siloed” operation of its divisions. For example, a new
Assistant Director of Programming and Reintegration position was created to bridge the gap between
the ADC and the ACC on reintegration issues for offenders.
For Arkansas Forward, DOC is focusing on investing in its staff through improved training and giving
leaders tools to be successful including leadership training (DOC-04), technology (DOC-05), and
data (DOC-08), as opposed to organizational chart changes.
At this time, the plan for DOC’s future state organization is to continue with the current organizational
structure, as included in Figure 1, while working to identify additional efficiencies and moving
forward with the initiatives described above to improve the performance of its organization. For
example, one change as reflected in Figure 2 is to split the role of Human Resources and Training
Administrator into two positions to support the Arkansas Forward initiatives focused on staff
development.
Figure 2 – Future Organizational Structure*
*As of November 2024
How this Department will meet the vision of an efficient and effective
future department
DOC has taken a comprehensive approach in the identification of its Arkansas Forward initiatives: to
identify opportunities to improve processes and invest in the development of its staff. DOC has
identified means to achieve improvement while operating within its existing resources for most of
these initiatives. Technology investments are one area that may require additional funding to support
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
system enhancements and to improve data quality. Other initiatives could require funding for
additional staff resources and one statutory revision as it relates to data collection.
Key Initiatives Prioritized for Arkansas Forward
Implementation
DOC leadership generated 7 ideas to improve departmental effectiveness and efficiency as part of
Arkansas Forward, focusing on improving operations and investing in staff.
DOC-01: Improve the purchasing process at DOC
DOC will enhance its purchasing process by increasing efficiency and improving transparency and
status tracking. The initiative focuses on helping DOC to streamline the process, ensuring that
purchases reach approvers more quickly with less effort by staff, and approvers can make the right
decisions more quickly. This will ensure DOC gets the goods and services it needs faster and with
less effort by staff and leadership. In addition, training and professional development resources may
be identified for DOC purchasing and procurement staff to enable them to improve the quality of
DOC’s purchasing and procurement processes and identify additional process improvements
beyond what is included in this report.
Initiative Overview and Current State: According to DOC data, over 10,000 purchase orders
are processed in a typical year, 134 contracts are executed, and over 46,000 deliveries are made.
Given this volume, inefficiencies within the purchasing and procurement processes can create
considerable delays and staff frustration.
DOC’s purchasing processes are complex and have become onerous and inefficient, partly due to
DOC’s adherence to purchasing requirements, but also because of actions DOC has taken. Staff
requesting purchases lack basic templates and standard justifications for commonly purchased
items. There is no clear guidance or use of re-order thresholds for commonly purchased items. For
instance, when an administrative supply is needed, the request must navigate through several layers
of approval within the division of origin and then to the Budget Administrator. These inefficiencies
can be found in all divisions.
Escalation to leadership can add time to the overall approval process because they may be farther
removed from the day-to-day operations and need to conduct additional research about the
necessity of a purchase before providing approval. Typically, purchases are recurring and a rationale
must be provided for the purchase with each request.
Additionally, the current process lacks transparency and a clear status tracking tool so even once
approvals are obtained, only the procurement and accounting departments have visibility into their
status and the requestor may not realize approvals have been provided. DOC lacks a tool to use to
track procurement and purchasing requests through the approval process. While there are statewide
technology solutions that may support status tracking in the future (such as the S4HANA
replacement for AASIS, led by the Department of Finance and Administration), much remains
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
unknown about the functionality of these systems and how they will integrate with other
departmental tools.
Rationale: DOC is currently facing challenges within its purchasing processes, which also hinder
operational processes. DOC-01 directs the department to implement process improvements to
enhance efficiency and to provide training for staff involved in purchasing and procurement to
elevate expertise and support identification of further operational improvements. A high-level plan
has been developed that focuses on streamlining workflows, enhancing transparency, and providing
comprehensive training for staff. By implementing these strategic changes, DOC aims to create a
more efficient and responsive procurement system that better meets the needs of its operations and
staff.
Streamline the requisition process: To address the complexities and delays in the current
procurement process, DOC will implement a more streamlined requisition workflow. Introducing
standard work into the process will greatly reduce the amount of time and effort required for
purchases. Beginning with the items staff purchase most commonly (e.g., office supplies) is the ideal
way to start. Staff can then work with that team to develop a pre-approved set of justification
language for each of those items. If staff uses the pre-set language when making the purchasing
request, less effort will be required of them, approvers can review more quickly to issue approval or
denial, and questions back and forth will be substantially reduced.
Enhance visibility and tracking: The introduction of an automated system for requisition tracking
will provide status visibility throughout the procurement process. By implementing tools such as
Smart Sheet (a statewide capability led by the Department of Transformation and Shared Services)
or integrating with existing systems like S4HANA, the department can ensure that all stakeholders
have access to real-time information about the status of their requests. This transparency will reduce
confusion and miscommunication, allowing for better collaboration between the procurement team
and operational staff.
Provide comprehensive training and reinforce compliance: To support the new streamlined
processes, DOC will establish comprehensive training programs for all staff involved in purchasing
and procurement. This training will focus on the new procedures, the importance of providing
sufficient justifications for requests, and the utilization of new tracking systems. Leaders in the
department’s procurement process will receive additional professional development and training to
support additional process improvements. Additionally, DOC will reinforce the importance of
adherence to established processes through ongoing communication and support.
By implementing these changes, the DOC can create a more efficient, transparent, and responsive
purchasing and procurement process that better serves the needs of its staff and operations. These
solutions not only address the current challenges but also lay the groundwork for a sustainable and
effective procurement strategy going forward.
To identify challenges with the current process and identify a strategy to improve it, the DOC team
created several tools, including:
• SIPOC (Suppliers, Inputs, Processes, Outputs, and Customers) diagram (see Figure 3): A
SIPOC is a visual tool used to map the boundaries of a process. It helps identify all the key
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
elements involved, including suppliers, inputs, the process itself, outputs, and customers.
This clarity is beneficial for understanding the process flow, identifying potential bottlenecks,
and improving overall efficiency and effectiveness.
• Strategic Compass: A Strategic Compass is a tool that helps to identifies the high-level
process steps and goal for the impacted process (see Figure 4).
• Process Map: A detailed process map was developed to document the key process steps in
the current process, to be a foundation for process improvement (see Figures 5 and 6).
Figure 3 – SIPOC Analysis
Suppliers Inputs Processes Outputs Customers
• Administration • Requisition or • Establish Need • Services • Unit/Department/
• Leadership Purchase • Complete • Supplies Division
• Business Request Requisition • Agreement/ • Business
Manager • Specifications/ • Approvals Purchase Manager or
• Cost Centers Details • Purchase Order Order Admin
• End Users • Approval(s) • Receive
• Funding for Goods/Services
purchase • Payment
• Adequate
justification
Source: Developed in work session with DOC staff held on August 28, 2024.
Figure 4 – Procurement Strategic Compass Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with DOC staff held on August 28, 2024.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Figure 5 – Current State Map – Purchasing/Procurement Process
Source: Developed in work session with DOC staff held on August 28, 2024. While this map reflects the two
largest divisions, the procurement processes for the smaller divisions are also in need of streamlining.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Figure 6 – Current State Map - Approval Thresholds
Source: Developed in work session with DOC staff held on August 28, 2024. While these maps capture
processes for the Department’s two largest divisions, they also reflect processes used by smaller divisions.
Implementation Considerations:
• In a facilitated work session with DOC staff, staff identified some of the barriers to
implementing an improved purchasing process, as well as solutions to address these
challenges (summarized in Figure 7 below). The goal of implementing an improved
purchasing process is shown in the blue box, with each barrier or challenge in a red box and
each related solution in a green box.
• Another factor that contributes to some of the inefficiency in purchasing is that the
departments for the Divisions of Correction and Community Corrections are separate,
requiring the divisions to conduct purchasing separately. Department leadership has
indicated combining budgets of these divisions could allow for bulk order of many items and
improve efficiency by reducing the number of deliveries and risk of delays.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Figure 7 – DOC-01 Interference Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with DOC staff held on August 28, 2024.
Overall, DOC identified two significant risks:
• Confusion and staff errors related to the new process. The success of the DOC-01 initiative
relies heavily on staff understanding and effectively using the new processes and tools. A
solution is to implement a comprehensive training program tailored to different staff roles
within the procurement process. This program may include hands-on training, resources
such as manuals or quick reference guides, and ongoing support through mentorship or a
help desk. Providing training sessions that accommodate different learning styles (e.g., in-
person, online, or blended formats) can enhance engagement and retention of new
information.
• Relaxing too many budgetary controls in the interest of process improvement. The intent of
this initiative is not to change the controls in place, but to establish guidance for staff to
ensure they understand the process.
Planned steps for improving purchasing (future state):
• Define “To Be” process and desired workflow for standardization, including identifying KPIs
and desired design (in progress).
o Create templates and standard work orders commonly purchased items.
o Review and update the approval process to streamline and eliminate manual steps
before software changes (in progress).
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
o Focus on an early use case by streamlining division purchasing from Arkansas
Correctional Industries (ACI) as well as ACI purchasing. Create standardized reorder
thresholds for common supplies.
• Identify other tracking systems used in Arkansas state government, such as Qualtrack,
S4HANA (developed by DFA) or Smart Sheet (TSS is negotiating an enterprise agreement).
• Work with TSS to purchase a tracking system, making use of enterprise contract if available.
• Implement IT automation to reduce process steps and errors through current design.
• Develop training resources for staff on new process and execute staff communication plan.
• Identify additional professional development and training resources for DOC purchasing and
procurement leaders.
Alignment of Department priorities with staffing and resources: DOC estimates the
initiative can be executed within existing resources. Certain aspects of the initiative, such as the
utilization of a TSS-led Smart Sheet contract, may require a nominal cost to implement.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
In enhancing the procurement process within DOC, it is crucial to distinguish between solutions that
directly impact process steps and those that improve execution quality. Solutions like creating
templates, streamlining purchasing from ACI, and implementing an automated system will optimize
workflows and enhance efficiency. Conversely, solutions such as additional training and
emphasizing adherence to established processes focus on improving the quality of execution. By
combining direct interventions with supportive measures, DOC can create a more effective and
reliable procurement system.
Solutions that will directly impact process steps:
• Create templates and standard work for commonly purchased items.
• Streamline purchasing from ACI.
• Have standardized reorder thresholds.
• Implement a tracking tool for requests. Options include Smart Sheet (or similar product, TSS
is leading an enterprise contract) and S4HANA, which is being developed by DFA.
• Ensure automated system allows user visibility into the state’s accounting system.
• Create a central repository for DOC information aside from AASIS (e.g., dashboards for
expenditures, warehouse, and food budget).
Solutions that will influence process steps:
• Additional training.
• Reiterate the importance of following processes through communication (e.g., emails,
posters, etc.).
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
• Time to process purchasing requests (from submission to approval, from approval to
delivery) (expected to decrease);
• Error rate in purchasing requests (expected to decrease);
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
• Percent of purchasing requests tracked in automated system (goal is 100%); and,
• Training completion rate for affected staff (goal is 100%).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: With 10,000 purchase orders completed each year, this initiative is
expected to have a positive operational impact at DOC and result in cost avoidance due to
operational efficiencies from reduced time spent preparing, reviewing, and approving purchasing
requests due to established guidance and compliance with policy. Assuming a time savings of 15
minutes per purchase order on the part of staff who submit the orders, and 15 minutes of time
savings for reviewers (assuming 2 levels of review), this would generate an operational savings of
5,000 hours. This would be spread across multiple staff within the organization and could be time to
be reallocated for other duties.
Reduction in processing time: By streamlining the requisition process and reducing approval levels
for lower-cost items, the DOC can significantly decrease the time spent on each procurement
request. This efficiency not only speeds up the acquisition of necessary supplies but also allows staff
to allocate their time to more critical tasks, ultimately leading to enhanced productivity across
divisions. The time saved can translate into labor cost savings over time.
Lower error rates: Implementing standardized templates and work processes will reduce the
likelihood of errors in requisitions. Fewer errors mean fewer returned requests and rework, which can
be both time-consuming and costly. By minimizing the number of corrections needed, the DOC can
save on administrative costs associated with processing and resubmitting requisitions, as well as the
potential costs incurred from purchasing incorrect items.
Improved visibility and accountability: An automated tracking system will enhance visibility in the
procurement process, reducing the likelihood of lost requisitions and untracked spending. By
ensuring that all requests are monitored in real-time, DOC can make more informed financial
decisions. This improved accountability can also help in identifying cost-saving opportunities, such
as bulk purchasing or renegotiating contracts based on actual usage data.
Better resource allocation: With comprehensive training and improved processes, staff will be
better equipped to understand and comply with procurement policies, reducing the risk of
miscommunication and misunderstandings.
Change Management Plan: This initiative is focused on improving the efficiency of the
purchasing process to support timely fulfillment of needs. This is an opportunity for DOC leadership
to communicate that it has heard from staff about the challenges with the existing process and the
department is investing in solutions to reduce staff frustration. It is not anticipated this initiative will
encounter significant staff resistance, but communication is needed to ensure staff understand new
policies and resources available. Messaging and modalities that could be used for each audience
are included in Figure 8.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Figure 8 – DOC-01 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Responsible Party
DOC Staff ● Benefits of the new ● Departmental Chad Brown
system/system ● Staff meetings
changes ● Virtual
● Timeline for meetings or
implementation roadshow
● How to use the system ● Memos
● How to access training ● Website
resources
DOC-02: Enhance payment efficiency by streamlining online portal
transactions and money order processes
DOC will enhance the efficiency of payments by streamlining the processes for online portal
transactions and money orders for restitution and commissary accounts. This initiative aims to
reduce processing times, minimize errors, and provide a more seamless experience for all users.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DOC is currently facing inefficiencies in the handling
of payments for restitution and commissary accounts. Most payments are processed through money
orders, a method that requires extensive manual processing, resulting in high operational costs and
frequent delays. This manual approach not only consumes valuable staff time but also creates room
for human error, further complicating the payment process. The current system lacks the
technological infrastructure needed to manage payments smoothly, leading to frequent issues that
slow down processing times and diminish the overall efficiency of DOC’s financial operations.
A major issue complicating the current system is the confusion among offenders about where
various types of payments should be directed. This often leads to payments being incorrectly sent to
DOC, such as court costs that should go to the courts. The misdirection of payments creates
additional burdens on the staff, who must manually redirect funds or issue refunds, further extending
processing times. This ongoing confusion is exacerbated by the lack of a streamlined system to guide
offenders in properly handling their financial obligations.
Despite the inefficiencies in the current payment process (summarized in Figure 9), DOC has an
existing opportunity to streamline operations through its current relationships with Keefe Group and
Tyler Technologies, vendors already managing financial services for correctional facilities in
Arkansas. In other states, Keefe Group also offers the capability to accept money orders and converts
them into electronic payments, however, this will take changes to eOMIS. DOC intends to accept
only payment through online methods and plans to implement this process by January 1, 2025, which
will significantly reduce the need for manual processing, alleviating the burden on staff and cutting
down processing times. Prior to this date, and as part of this implementation, DOC has begun the
process of informing he population that paper money orders will no longer be accepted. Importantly,
this service could be integrated without incurring any additional costs for the Department. This
method will help DOC transition to a more efficient, automated process while maintaining fiscal
responsibility.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Figure 9 – Current Payment Process
Source: Developed in work session with DOC staff held on August 28, 2024.
Rationale: DOC aims to streamline its operations and reduce the burden on staff. Using
conversion of money orders into electronic payments would allow DOC to minimize manual
intervention, eliminate processing errors, and expedite the payment flow. Additionally, collaborating
with TSS and DFA to create a centralized payment hub through the S4HANA system and amending
existing third-party contracts to use the payment hub further supports the Department’s goal of
modernizing its financial infrastructure.
By enabling offenders to pay restitution and fees electronically and using systems like S4HANA from
DFA, DOC could potentially eliminate the need for up to six staff positions over time as they become
vacant, providing significant cost savings. Moreover, automating these processes would reduce
errors and misdirected payments, freeing staff to focus on higher-priority tasks. Implementing a
seamless, centralized payment system would provide clear direction to offenders about where to
send payments, improving their ability to send payments to the correct location as well as improving
their ability to make timely payments.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Implementation Considerations:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
In a facilitated work session with DOC staff, staff identified some of the barriers to implementing
improved payment processes, as well as solutions to address these challenges (summarized in
Figure 10 below). The goal of implementing an improved payment process in shown in the blue box,
with each barrier or challenge in a red box and each related solution in a green box.
Figure 10 – Payment Processes Interference Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with DOC staff held on August 28, 2024.
During this session, staff identified the two most significant risks:
• The primary risk in implementing this initiative is that users continue to send money orders
erroneously. A communication plan must be developed to educate users about the change.
Additionally, the Post Office Box currently used to accept money orders can be closed so that
incorrectly submitted payments get refused and returned.
• DOC’s offender management system needs to be able to accept the files from the vendor.
DOC plans to confirm this capability.
Planned steps for establishing the future state:
• Identify money order solution (complete).
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
• Confirm that DOC’s offender management system is able to accept files from the vendor.
• Identify a project manager and develop project plan.
• Work with TSS and the existing vendor to develop a contract amendment or Memorandum of
Understanding (MOU) to include money orders.
• Prior to roll-out, develop and implement a stakeholder communication plan to ensure all
parties know when the new system will go-live and what actions to take.
• Work with vendor to execute project plan and implement the solution.
Alignment of Department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative
enables the Department to realize significant operational efficiencies while reallocating resources.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
The new plan seeks to eliminate the existing internal payment process by outsourcing the money
order operations to a vendor. Prioritize reducing staff through attrition and departmental transfer,
where appropriate.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
• Payment processing time (reduction expected);
• Error rate in payment processing (reduction expected);
• Percentage of payments processed electronically (expected to increase);
• Number of payments in need of redirection (expected to decrease); and,
• Utilization rate of new payment methods.
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: The estimated annual savings for this initiative is approximately $250,000
in recurring savings, $2,000 in recurring envelope costs, and $1,200 in Post Office Box rental costs.
By outsourcing the money order processing to a vendor, DOC can eliminate the manual labor
currently required for processing payments. This shift would enable the Department to repurpose or
eliminate up to six staff positions, leading to reductions in salary and administrative costs.
Additionally, automating the process through a vendor would reduce the likelihood of errors,
misdirected payments, and processing delays, further lowering operational costs associated with
error correction.
Furthermore, the transition to electronic processing would reduce the reliance on physical
resources, such as paper and mailing costs, associated with handling money orders internally. This
creates a cost-effective, streamlined payment system that would yield long-term financial benefits
while improving the efficiency and accuracy of payment management.
Change Management Plan: A communication strategy is important for the success of
implementation. Messaging and modalities that could be used for each audience are included in
Figure 11.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Figure 11 – DOC-02 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Responsible Party
Offenders and Families ● Announcement of new ● Website Chad Brown
payment process and ● Lobby TVs at
timeline for correctional
implementation. This facilities
includes a telephone ● Social Media
number if platforms
offenders/families
have questions.
Announcement
messages will be in
both English and
Spanish.
● Clearly written
instructions for how to
use the system
including a telephone
number to call if there
are issues.
● Clearly written
Frequently Asked
Questions (FAQ)
DOC-03: Leverage training services across DOC divisions
This initiative focuses on the DOC’s ability to best leverage training services for its divisions, with
focus on reducing the administrative costs of training for ADC and ACC by eliminating duplication
and sharing resources.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Today, training is managed by individual DOC
divisions, resulting in the existence of multiple training academies, including one for ADC corrections
officers and one for ACC corrections officers. There is a separate training program for Community
Corrections division Probation and Parole Officers, however they are not included in this review, as
they have distinct requirements and are required to be certified as law enforcement officers by the
Arkansas Commission on Law Enforcement.
The existence of separate training units at ADC and ACC pre-dates the 2019 formation of DOC, which
combined multiple agencies into divisions under the DOC umbrella. Because these divisions were
once distinct departments, each built independent training programs to meet their needs. The result
is that each division is spending resources on staff and training curricula with duplication of effort.
The divisions continue to conduct training in different cities: ADC training is conducted primarily in
England and ACC training is primarily conducted in Little Rock, creating barriers to combining the
two academies. In addition, training surveys and staff training records are located separately in each
division.
The Human Resources and Training Administrator is housed in the DOC Secretary’s office, but
trainers are considered DOC Shared Services employees. Training is structured with eleven training
positions, two supervisors and two administrators, one of each for ADC and ACC. Several positions
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
are currently vacant as the result of budget management and turnover. Low wages make it difficult to
fill training positions as many unit or residential positions draw higher pay. Trainers are paid based on
the origin of the position pre-transformation. For example, if a training position was previously
housed in ADC, the salary is paid from the ADC budget; likewise, for ACC. DOC has no authority to
transfer funds across budgets in the current appropriations structure. Additionally, there are unit
training officers embedded in DOC facilities that do not currently report to the to the Human
Resources and Training Administrator.
ADC newly hired security staff are required to complete the 240-hour Basic Correctional Officer
Training (BCOT) before starting a security position at a prison unit. Certain Non-Security employees
(Unit Training Supervisors, Construction/Maintenance Supervisors, Food Production, Recreational
Supervisors and Farm Supervisors) also attend BCOT training.
ACC newly hired security staff are required to complete a 140-hour basic training before starting a
position at a community corrections residential facility. . There is a significant overlap in the training
topics required by ADC and ACC.
Rationale: ADC and ACC each have their own identity and culture, which has led to continued
operation of each division independently in silos. As a result, there are missed opportunities to
leverage resources, including through creation of a more efficient and effective combined training
team. This initiative is an important priority of the DOC Secretary and seeks to continue the
integration into a united DOC by consolidating the separate training units and forming one shared
services training academy that meets the similar training needs of ADC and ACC. In addition, the
central unit will implement process improvements such as consistently capturing training feedback
through post-training surveys, which is not captured consistently across divisions today. A
centralized training academy could leverage the training locations of both departments to minimize
staff travel costs.
Another opportunity would be to leverage learning management system (LMS) licenses between the
two divisions. ADC primarily uses extract data from eOMIS®, a corrections software program to
collect training data. ACC primarily uses Relias, which houses training data and provides remote
learning opportunities. RELIAS requires the purchase of licenses. DOC currently owns 4,400 RELIAS
licenses at an annual cost of $176,000, or $40 per license. ADC has 2,692 user licenses and ACC has
1,349 user licenses. However, ACC uses RELIAS for remote training more than ADC, despite ADC
having greater access to RELIAS licenses. An analysis of the assignment of RELIAS licenses across
divisions would be beneficial to inform future license purchasing decisions; reallocation of existing
licenses may be more cost effective for the department.
Implementation Considerations:
Appendix A - DOC Work Plan provides the action steps in the planned sequence for implementation
of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through interviews and
work sessions with DOC staff and review of best practices research include:
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
The National Institute of Corrections Learning and Performance Initiative provides resources and
technical assistance to those who provide training in a correctional setting. 1 Its goal is to assist
corrections agencies in building staff training and development capacity and offers a variety of
resources for trainers and curriculum developers. Resources available include:
• Training Management - A guide to the resources available to corrections trainers.
• Instructional Design - A guide to instructional models and resources for designing
corrections-related training.
• Training Delivery - A guide to effectively facilitating and presenting training and resources for
conducting corrections-related training.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
In a work session with DOC staff, challenges in implementing a standard and streamlined training
program were identified (shown in Figure 12 in red). Staff brainstormed solutions for each of these
barriers (in green).
Figure 12 – Training Interference Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with DOC staff held on September 5, 2024.
1
National Institute of Corrections, Learning and Performance Initiative,
https://nicic.gov/resources/resources-topics-and-roles/topics/learning-and-performance
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
DOC leadership will need to manage the change to ensure staff understand and are supportive of the
consolidation. There may be some reluctance to combine these functions and some of the cultural
differences will impact how a shared training unit operates (e.g., ADC has not embraced virtual
training while ACC has maximized use of virtual training). There will also be differences in concepts
and terminology that will have to be addressed in any shared courses. DOC leadership plans to
develop a detailed communication plan to unify stakeholders and achieve successful
implementation that outlines the “why” behind the change.
Planned steps for implementing one combined training academy (future state):
The planned steps to implement this initiative have been informed by these potential risks and
proposed solutions:
• Explore best practices in culture change and self-assessment of performance. Develop a
detailed plan to unify stakeholders and to achieve successful implementation of the
combined training academies. This step is in-process.
• Develop one training team, consolidating resources to serve ADC and ACC.
• Inventory available classes/curriculum to create a common core training for both divisions.
Additional training specific to each division may be trained separately from the academy.
• Implement the newly developed curriculum as a pilot presenting it to newly hired staff.
• Determine one platform for housing training data across divisions.
• Develop a uniform staff survey to provide feedback on what revisions should be made to the
curriculum. Revise as data is collected to ensure the survey is providing useful information
for measuring training effectiveness.
• Develop a refresher course for ADC and ACC to avoid expending resources when staff move
from one division to the other. Do not train staff repeatedly in the same courses.
• Determine the courses that are best delivered electronically and those that require in-person
learning. Standardize this across divisions.
• Develop a central uniform process or location to notify staff of available training
classes/courses.
• Determine the feasibility and cost-effectiveness of consolidating physical training locations.
Create training environments where both divisions feel comfortable. For training outside
Little Rock and England, consider using ADC and ACC facilities interchangeably.
• Develop tools to measure transfer of knowledge post-training and on-the-job.
• DOC leadership plans to invest in and create incentives to retain training staff.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative is one
of the top priorities of DOC and continues the work of integrating DOC’s divisions into one, unified
department. Training represents a shared services area where further integration of DOC’s team is
possible and would be beneficial in terms of reducing duplication and administrative costs.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: Once combined, the new training unit will need to review policies and procedures to
determine new, unified operating processes. This should result in the sharing of best practices across
the training teams and could result in process changes.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs: DOC plans to implement the
combined training academy with no additional financial resources unless DOC determines that the
purchase of additional RELIAS licenses is necessary. If so, the cost would be $40 per license
annually. DOC plans to proactively monitor staff access to the RELIAS software to ensure the
employee needs/is using it and to terminate the license when an employee leaves. If DOC chooses
to contract with a professional organizational culture change provider there would be a one-time
indeterminate cost.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation: The expected
impacts of this initiative are to consolidate training programs for ADC and ACC to improve
efficiencies and reduce administrative cost. Some of the key performance measures include:
• Number of Training Unit full-time staff (expected to decrease as divisions are combined);
• Number of staff trained by central team; (expected to increase) and,
• Satisfaction with training (measured by post-training survey feedback).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: It seems likely that there could be savings from combining the two
academies as savings would be generated from sharing of trainers, facilities, curricula, and licenses
for learning management systems. Indeterminate long-term savings could be achieved if the
improvements in training lead to an increase in employee retention.
Change Management Plan: This initiative may include establishment of uniform processes.
Clear communication with staff about the purpose for the changes will accompany any information
on the new process changes. Key activities and timing for the communication plan are included in
Appendix A – DOC Work Plan and summarized in Figure 13.
Figure 13 – DOC-03 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
ADC and ACC The two academies will be Meetings Training Director,
Directors/Supervisors merged and revised accordingly. DOC Secretary, Chief
This effort will improve of Staff
effectiveness and efficiency in
training.
Both divisions will be customers
of this shared services team.
Training Staff The two academies will be Meetings Training Director,
merged and revised accordingly. DOC Secretary, Chief
Your role will be to support both of Staff
ADC and ACC as your
customers.
All DOC Staff Addressing culture differences Meetings, potential DOC Secretary and
between the two divisions. for contracting Chief of Staff
with a professional
culture change
provider.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
DOC-04: Revise leadership training program
This initiative focuses on DOC’s need to review and revise the current leadership training within the
Training Unit to address management inconsistencies within and across all divisions. The training will
address leadership skills at various supervisory levels.
Initiative Overview and Current State: The Human Resources and Training Administrator,
housed in the DOC Secretary’s office, is responsible for Human Resources responsibilities and the
management of the department’s training program, including the leadership training. Leadership
training is centralized while the ADC and ACC training academies are decentralized. The training
function includes eleven training positions, two supervisors and two administrators. Several
positions are currently vacant as the result of budget management and turnover.
Currently, all management-level employees participate in leadership training, as a requirement of
the assignment to supervisory positions. Leadership training is available to all DOC divisions.
Leadership training consists of four levels. Prerequisites for each level include placement in a
position within the targeted rank or grade that is a supervisory position and completion of the
previous training level. DOC has not conducted Level IV training for several years, as other training
classes have been prioritized.
• Leadership Development I - targets Security staff (Sergeants and Food Preparation
Managers) and first line supervisory non-Security staff. Must be completed within six months
of job assignment;
• Leadership Development II - targets Security staff (Lieutenants) and Non-Security second
line supervisors. Must be completed within one year of job assignment;
• Leadership Development III Advanced Management Training - targets Security staff
(Captains and Majors) and higher level non-Security staff; and,
• Leadership Development IV Executive Training - conducted quarterly as a refresher course
for the highest level of leadership.
• The Supervisors Annual Refresher course is a four-hour annual refresher course for
supervisory staff that have completed at least the Department’s Leadership Level 1 training.
Participants discuss current trends and topics and revisit previously delivered lessons. The
course is driven by the belief that the repeated delivery of information promotes retention of
knowledge.
Leadership training addresses many topics at various levels. While new topics are trained at each
level, reinforcement of skills learned in previous training is also provided. The leadership training
materials are not currently available online; all courses are delivered in-person in either Little Rock
or England, with occasional exceptions for remote attendance.
The leadership training is a combination of courses developed at various intervals over time. Portions
of the training are 15 years old. Courses have been modified periodically with no organized approach.
The content of some of the courses is outdated and likely uses an ineffective approach for the current
workforce. For example, two courses, “Staff Discipline” and “Administering Discipline” may not
appeal to younger employees.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
An unintended consequence of the 2019 transformation of DOC, which combined multiple agencies
into divisions under an umbrella DOC, was the inability to merge individual agencies with different
purposes and cultures into one singular entity and culture. DOC continues its efforts to bring the
differing cultures of individual divisions into one cohesive department with common values and
goals.
Rationale: The existing leadership training needs a significant revision and refresh to incorporate
more current leadership strategies and additional best practices. Steps to improve the leadership
training include:
• Implement departmental succession planning;
• Identify core leadership competencies DOC wants to include in its leadership training;
• Review existing training curricula to determine where there are gaps in aligning with the core
competencies;
• Review existing training curricula to determine where content is out of date and needs
replacement;
• Revise curricula to align with competencies and include current best practices strategies;
• Review modalities used in training to determine if online learning or other methods such as
mentoring can be used to improve training delivery;
• Implement pre- and post-training assessments to capture outcomes of training; and,
• Track outcomes for recipients of leadership training to determine return on investment for the
project.
Implementation Considerations: Best practices indicate that succession planning is a key
step in preparing staff for promotion at all levels, and that supervisors at every level should be
discussing succession planning with their staff. A variety of tools are available to assist management
in developing succession plans.
The Academy to Innovate Human Resources (AIHR) has identified best practices for succession
planning, some of which are listed below:
• Start early and plan continuously:
• Develop a formal succession plan;
• Involve senior leadership;
• Identify key positions and skills;
• Assess the current talent;
• Invest in professional development; and,
• Implement mentoring and coaching programs.
DOC may benefit from consulting with other Arkansas departments who conduct leadership training.
Two departments with leadership programs highlighted by the Arkansas Forward Project may be
good sources for information sharing to inform the reshaping of the DOC leadership training.
The Department of Finance and Administration (DFA) operates the DFA-U, which is a department-
wide leadership program designed to identify employees within the department that demonstrate
the characteristics and desire to be future leaders within DFA. DFA-U “aligns with the department’s
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mission by assessing leadership gaps, identifying potential leaders, and preparing these individuals
to meet the department’s growing leadership needs.” DFA-U is also considered an important
deviation from the “silos” that traditionally defined DFA.
The Arkansas Department of Public Safety (DPS) recently implemented a Leadership Academy that
it seeks to make available to other departments (DPS-05). The Leadership Academy offers a variety
of interchangeable courses structured in 16-hour increments. Customers (internal teams or external
law enforcement entities) choose the courses they would like to take and the training team delivers
training on the requested courses. The DPS Leadership Academy offers four levels of training
designed for personnel at various points in their careers: new hires, and employees at the three, five,
and seven-year service marks. The developers incorporated a strong presence of wellness in each of
the courses, at all levels. The academy also offers a course that specifically addresses individual
wellness including physical, emotional, relational, spiritual, and financial wellness. Other more
traditional leadership topics include:
• Communication;
• Conflict resolution;
• Decision-making;
• Leading across generations; and,
• Organizational change.
Other states have successfully offered state-wide, multi-stage leadership training to help identify,
develop, and retain public sector employees. Figure 14 outlines a best practice from the Texas Health
and Human Services Commission (HHSC), which has developed a leadership program consisting of
four modules, two programs and two “academies” to serve four departments. Through this
leadership program HHSC has reached the 53,000 employees of HHSC. The program has existed for
12 years, with a retention rate of ~70% for all employees who have completed the program and an
advancement rate of ~50%. HHSC program staff indicate that the rewards of their program are that
the programs are highly visible, help further growth, and participants are able to network with agency
employees with whom they would otherwise never work. Graduates receive certificates as well as
training hours.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Figure 14 – Best Practice: Texas Health and Human Services Commission
Program Program Features
• Meant for high performing individuals, not managers or supervisors, that want
to grow within their own skill set and within agency.
• Four months in duration and it is 100% virtual.
• Program consists of four sessions and then a graduation ceremony. The
sessions are 1.5-2 days.
• The purpose of ECP is for the employees to “Own Their Influence.” They are
taught that leadership is influence and they leave with understanding that
they take ownership of that principle.
Extraordinary
• Participants are paired up with a “Transitional Mentor” – a front-line manager
Contributors
that has made the transition to manager in the last two years. The Transitional
Program (ECP)
Mentor is supposed to connect with the mentee on at least 4 sessions outside
the program sessions.
• Participants are asked to do projects and come up with recommendations, for
example: how do you make meetings meaningful?
• This program offers an opportunity to serve as coach; participants get a book
called “Active Coaching” and receive a ½ day or full day of coaching.
• The program puts participants in groups of six, which helps develop an bond
with five peers.
• Participants are high performing individuals who want to move into
management or supervision.
• Program assesses whether employees are equipped to make the shift
mentally and emotionally to leadership roles: are employees individual
contributions to a team or someone who can lead a team?
Aspiring Leaders
• Focus on the different mental and emotional skill set needed to supervise
Program (ALP)
people.
• Objective for program is clarity – do they really want to supervise people?
• The program is 4 months in duration; with 1.5 day sessions occurring
approximately every 3 weeks.
• The program offers a hybrid option of in-person or Zoom participation.
• The academy is for those new to the management and the leadership ladder.
• Attendees are taught from the book “The Five Dysfunctions of the Team” by
Rising Leaders
Patrick Lencioni.
Academy (RLA)
• This academy includes in-depth leadership learning.
• A 360 Self-Assessment is required for each participant.
• The Executive Leadership academy is for senior leaders, senior managers and
directors, to help prepare for executive leadership.
Executive • Unlike other leadership programs, for this academy, the head of the agency
Leadership must approve a candidate’s attendance.
Academy • A 360 Self-Assessment is required and candidates must also complete a
leadership development plan.
• Attendees are assigned a mentor.
Source: Interview with Texas Health and Human Services Commission official.
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For the ECP and ALP programs, participants complete an application, which a manager has to
approve. Applications are based on first come first served. Program cohorts are limited to 36
participants for these programs. For the Academies, seats are selected by the executives in the
agency. Academies meet for a total of six months. For all the programs, there is homework and
prework, and for ELA, participants must come back to give a 15-minute presentation after they have
completed the program.
HHSC reviews their leadership program every two years. Evaluations by participants are based on
three principles: was the content relevant, reliable and applicable. Program staff at HHSC stressed
that important factors of the program’s success are: 1. That they do not spend time on agency
information and do not have directors or bureau heads come in to give talks; 2. They do not use a
traditional classroom; 3. They do not use the words “training” or “curriculum” or “info dump” – the
curricula for their programs instead aim to be “fluid and organic” and focused on applicable tools
that are relevant to the current workforce. The topics evolve between years. For graduates of their
programs, there is an Alumni Association, which enables graduates to continue their leadership
development. Alumni have access to an alumni listserv and there is also a newsletter that is sent out
to graduates.
Appendix A - DOC Work Plan provides the action steps in the planned sequence for implementation
of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process identified through interviews and
work sessions with DOC staff and review of best practices research.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
The leadership training will likely require additional funding as DOC does not have sufficient
resources to devote to the project. The estimated cost for an in-house curriculum developer ranges
from a starting salary of $46,123- $67,740. 2 This investment would support ongoing development of
training resources. Alternately, DOC could purchase a curriculum or contract with a curriculum
developer. The Training Administrator has other duties which prohibit him from committing the time
necessary to develop a modernized, effective set of courses. If additional funding is not available for
this purpose, DOC could reorganize existing resources to prioritize leadership training development.
Planned steps for revising leadership training (future state):
The planned steps to implement this initiative have been informed by these potential risks and
proposed solutions:
• Contract with or hire a professional curriculum developer with experience in leadership
training development for corrections agencies. Alternatively, DOC could assign a team lead
within the Training Unit to research best practices useful in modernizing the leadership
training.
• Collaborate with other departments to gain knowledge of their effective leadership training
strategies and topics. Borrow from curricula that have been effective for other
departments.
• Rework course titles, descriptions, and content to reflect leadership strategies that
empower and support positive employee performance.
2
Zippia, “Curriculum Developer Salary,” https://www.zippia.com/salaries/curriculum-developer/.
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• Ensure leadership training is focused on leadership skills that any employee in any division
or position may use to become an effective leader.
• Incorporate succession planning courses into all levels of leadership training. Utilize best
practices research in talent targeting and career development in designing the curriculum,
including beginning succession planning early in an employee's career and utilizing
mentors and coaches to assist in supervisory development.
• Develop dynamic annual refresher courses for supervisors. Do not require supervisors to
repeatedly attend courses with little new or different content.
• Update and modernize current curriculum to train staff on the most current Arkansas state
policies and procedures as well as any legislative updates.
• Determine data collection variables that indicate the impact of the training on staff and
department culture.
• Create metrics for key performance indicators that inform based on data collected.
• Develop and implement a formal Train the Trainers program for leadership training. Choose
from existing leaders that are skilled in leadership techniques. Avoid leaders that think
leadership training’s focus should be training staff to become proficient in specific job duties
instead of leadership abilities that transfer across positions and divisions.
• Review which courses could be delivered online and digitize the portions of leadership
training that can be made available online.
Alignment of department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative is one
of the top priorities for DOC and seeks to provide quality leadership training to those with an interest
in leading staff. The existing leadership training is in need of improvements and will require
significant additional resources to accomplish the task.
Process changes, associated with implementing changes in the strategic
plans: The Training Administrator, whose responsibility it is to revise the leadership training, also
serves as the Human Resources Director. These dual functions may limit available time for this
project; DOC could consider elevating a member of the existing training team to be a lead
responsible for the program redesign, notwithstanding the resource of a curriculum developer if
possible. DOC is in the process of hiring a Training Administrator to move those responsibilities from
the Human Resources Director.
Estimation of any anticipated costs and staffing needs:
DOC will require additional resources to fully revise and implement leadership training.
Recommendations include:
• Utilize a professional curriculum developer with leadership training experience. A curriculum
developer with 0-2 years of experience earns an average entry-level salary of $46,123. A mid-
career curriculum developer with 3-6 years of experience makes $53,226 a year on average.
A senior level curriculum developer with 7-12 years of experience enjoys an average annual
salary of $67,740. 3 A consultant curriculum writer could be hired to develop this training.
3
Zippia, “Curriculum Developer Salary.”
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• Another option is to purchase an off-the shelf leadership training program, which would likely
result in a per participant cost and would not be specific to the needs of DOC. Leadership
training workshops are also offered across the country but that option would likely be the
costliest considering enrollment and travel costs of thousands of dollars per training.
There will be additional costs if DOC digitizes the leadership training materials dependent upon the
software tool chosen.
DOC may seek grant funding to offset the costs of the options chosen.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The expected impacts of this initiative are to improve leadership training at DOC. Some of the key
performance measures include:
● Satisfaction rate of those completing training (expected to increase);
● Retention rate of those completing training (after one year) (expected to increase);
● Promotion rate of those completing training (expected to increase);
● Turnover rate of the units where the leader has completed training (expected to decrease);
and,
● Number/rate of leaders whose pre- and post-course tests demonstrate an increased score
(transfer of learning) (expected to increase).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented:
Indeterminate long-term savings could be achieved if leadership training is successful in helping
supervisors target qualified leadership candidates and in improving the quality of DOC leaders
through training. This could result in a variety of operational benefits, including improving how
leaders manage their teams, reducing staff turnover, improving morale, and improving productivity.
Change Management Plan: This initiative will impact available resources for DOC’s leaders.
This is an opportunity for DOC to share the efforts it is taking to invest in and develop leaders, and
how critical it views leadership in driving the future success of the organization. Key activities and
timing for the communication plan are included in Appendix A – DOC Work Plan and summarized
in Figure 15 – DOC-04 Communication Plan.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Figure 15 – DOC-04 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
DOC Division • Leaders are critical to the future of this Meetings DOC Secretary
Directors, other organization. We know how important leadership Emails and Chief of
leadership staff is in reducing turnover, improving morale, and Staff
improving productivity.
• We value our leaders and are investing in
updating and improving leadership training
through the Arkansas Forward initiative.
• We are going to revise and improve leadership
training, and will be inviting you and the leaders
in your organization to attend.
• This should improve efficiency and effectiveness
by providing additional skills development to
leaders.
All DOC Staff • We are going to revise and improve leadership Meetings, Supervisors
training. If you are interested in developing emails
leadership skills, you may want to consider
attending the new courses when revisions are
complete.
[INSERT details on how to enroll and when it is
appropriate to enroll.]
DOC-05: Improve IT centralization to meet DOC needs
Arkansas Forward’s future vision for statewide shared services is that while each department would
lead on its own applications, other information technology functions would be centralized at the
Department of Transformation and Shared Services to enable the State to realize a number of
efficiencies. Given this vision for a statewide shared services model, DOC will collaborate with TSS
to meet the department’s pressing IT needs by establishing service levels to support DOC’s
operations.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Uptime and proper functioning of its information
technology systems is critical to DOC, given that it is a corrections agency, and any loss of service or
system failure can be a significant public safety issue. The current division of IT responsibilities
between DOC and TSS reflects an evolving centralization process, where both departments perform
distinct roles. The current state reflects several inefficiencies and risks that need to be addressed.
The dependency on TSS for routine tasks, delays in resolving technical issues, and the lack of formal
collaboration mechanisms hinder DOC's ability to effectively manage its IT operations. The purpose
of this initiative is to clarify the respective duties of DOC and TSS Division of Information Services
(DIS), ensure the prioritization of DOC’s IT needs, and establish service level agreements, which will
ensure the coming centralization can be successful.
Today, DOC maintains a central IT function, consisting of 34 full-time employees (FTEs). DOC’s team
maintains the department’s offender management system (eOMIS®), which is vital to its operations.
DOC is responsible for maintaining SharePoint, providing desktop support, overseeing fiber
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
installation, and managing both the development and production environments within DOC’s data
centers. The IT team also manages some minor some telephony tasks, such as activating or
deactivating phones.
TSS’ DIS manages critical infrastructure for the state’s network and also oversees the Microsoft
licensing contract, as well as a variety of other enterprise tools. TSS also manages all aspects of the
telephone systems, including networking, fiber, routers, and Cisco VOIP, along with long-distance
services.
There are several challenges with the current arrangement:
• DOC remains dependent on TSS for key tasks, such as acquiring key codes for Microsoft SQL
through DIS and maintaining web services.
• Phone activation at DOC sometimes involves cumbersome billing issues, often requiring
follow-ups. Resolving wired or desk phone issues can take up to 3–4 months due to delays
and conflicting tickets within TSS. DOC has implemented the "Kurmi" solution to manage
some of the telephone services, as much of the responsibility now falls on DOC rather than
DIS.
• DOC has requested additional self-service solutions similar to Kurmi, as DIS continues to
limit access to many IT functions, such as Microsoft Tenant management and pushing out
updates. For these tasks, DOC is often told to "just put in a ticket," forcing a reliance on DIS
for even minor IT adjustments. Staff are required to submit work tickets for most technical
issues, which are then funneled through DIS.
Rationale: One of the key action steps in the plan is to develop detailed service level agreements
(SLAs) that outline the responsibilities of both DOC and DIS. By understanding and clearly
documenting the level of service that DIS will provide, along with the specific services that DOC will
continue to manage internally, both agencies can avoid confusion and DOC can ensure their needs
are met. SLAs will be important in ensuring the prioritization of DOC’s needs. For example, while
DOC will still manage tasks such as SharePoint and desktop support, TSS will be responsible for
larger infrastructure tasks, including telephone systems and server maintenance. Through SLAs,
DOC can avoid the frustration they are currently experiencing with the “just put in a ticket” process.
The SLAs will require TSS to be responsive to DOC needs within specified timeframes. This SLA
process and the separation of duties allows each agency to focus on their areas of expertise,
improving overall efficiency and accountability.
Finally, by combining the SLA process with maintaining some autonomy over certain IT functions,
DOC can avoid some current pain points, such as long wait times for resolving issues. One of the
challenges currently faced by DOC is the significant delay in resolving telephone system issues,
which has led to the implementation of the “Kurmi” solution as a workaround. The new plan aims to
address these types of issues by establishing SLAs that specify a timeline for resolving system
outages and developing a process for better collaboration between DOC and DIS. Additionally; by
setting up a timely notification system for cost increases and giving DOC more access to self-service
solutions, the plan will allow DOC to manage its budget more effectively and reduce its dependency
on external support for day-to-day tasks. This balance of centralization with maintained DOC
responsibility ensures that DOC remains agile while benefiting from DIS’s infrastructure and
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
resources. Coordinating with DIS can help to ensure that the best possible balance is maintained,
enabling DIS to provide services on behalf of DOC while DOC IT continues to provide critical IT
support as well. DOC and DIS will carefully consider and decide which functions should reside with
which agency. There are some unique functional elements, similar to the phone issue, where it would
not be beneficial for DIS to manage since the functions may be too small and too unique to DOC for
DIS to wish to oversee directly.
Implementation Considerations:
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
In a work session with DOC staff, challenges in implementing SLAs were identified (shown in Figure
16 in red). Staff brainstormed solutions for each of these barriers (in green).
Figure 16 – IT Collaboration Interference Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with DOC staff held on September 4, 2024.
Overall, DOC identified three primary risks:
• DIS has not historically provided SLAs. DOC wishes to establish them in the Master Services
Agreement to provide clarity around the current shared services arrangement.
• DOC has unique needs as a public safety organization. It may be important to have
discussions at the Secretarial level to establish the prioritization of DOC’s needs, particularly
in a disaster recovery/business continuity situation.
• Historically, DIS and DOC have not always aligned on new costs or requirements with
sufficient notice to meet budgetary timeframes. Both agencies may get an early start on
developing requirements and estimating costs so they can meet budget deadlines.
Recommended Steps for Establishing the Future State:
• Obtain understanding/agreement with TSS (in progress).
o Understand SLA issues (in progress).
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
• Identify the specific services to be provided and clarify expected Service Level Agreements
(SLAs), including in areas of ticket resolution, provisioning of equipment, and system uptime,
among other areas.
• Clarify roles and document detailed processes for the interplay between TSS and DOC,
producing a diagram to clearly illustrate sequencing of responsibilities and points of handoff.
• Establish a process to resolve for DOC system outages.
o Develop a collaborative approach with TSS and the DIS Customer Relations Manager
for managing system outages and restoring services.
o Establish the prioritization for system restoration, prioritizing DOC's critical needs.
Alignment of Department priorities with staffing and resources: This initiative
supports the prioritization of DOC’s needs, managing service requests, and coordinating with DIS on
performance metrics and service levels. The internal IT team will still play an essential role in
overseeing DOC's internal environments, like eOMIS® and other specific applications, but with less
burden on hardware management. The workload will be reallocated, not increased, as staff transition
from hands-on system maintenance to a more collaborative role in managing IT services with DIS.
This strategic shift will enable DOC’s IT team to focus on ensuring operational continuity.
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
The IT process steps within DOC will inevitably change as the centralization with DIS progresses, but
the specific nature of those changes cannot be fully understood until the SLAs) and the assignments
of responsibilities between DOC and DIS are clearly delineated and agreed upon. Once DOC and DIS
formally define the roles and duties of each agency—whether in areas such as system maintenance,
issue resolution, or software management—DOC will be able to adapt its internal processes
accordingly. This agreement will be crucial in ensuring that workflows are optimized, responsibilities
are clear, and that both agencies are working efficiently towards their shared goals. Until that
alignment is reached, the exact details of how DOC's IT processes will evolve remain uncertain.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
• Average time to resolve tickets (expected to reduce);
• Percentage of tickets resolved within 48 hours (or other agreed-upon timeframe) (set a goal
such as 95% to meet); and,
• System downtime (expected to be close to zero); and,
• Outage response rate (expected to decrease or could set a goal for a particular threshold).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: In the short-term, this initiative is not expected to result in a fiscal impact
but will enhance effectiveness for the department through consistent system performance and
resolution of staff IT issues. DOC anticipates realizing several potential savings and efficiencies by
moving hosted systems to DIS in the future when further centralization occurs. Some of these savings
could be offset by potential cost increases in other areas as a result of purchasing through TSS (where
TSS costs are higher than DOC-sourced resources).
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Change Management Plan: Fostering a culture of collaboration between DOC and DIS will be
critical. There may be a gap in understanding between the departments about each other’s priorities
and operational needs, which could lead to inefficiencies and challenges. Beginning with leadership
and then extending to joint staff meetings and other forums, the departments can plan to meet
regularly to discuss how to work together to improve the functioning of the current IT model.
A communication plan with broader staff is not anticipated to be needed at this time.
DOC-07: Identify improvements in inter-departmental collaboration to
increase utilization of available community resources and programs
This initiative directs DOC to develop and implement cross-department collaboration to maximize
the use of local, state, and federal resources. DOC will improve internal coordination and identify
effective collaborations with other state and federal agencies, such as the Department of Commerce
(Workforce), Department of Education, Department of Human Services, Department of Health,
Arkansas Fair Housing Commission, Department of Finance and Administration (Motor Vehicles),
U.S. Social Security Administration, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the U.S.
Department of Education to increase awareness of and utilization of resources across these entities
that are available to individuals both in prison and at release.
Initiative Overview and Current State: Since the 2019 transformation, which combined
multiple agencies into divisions under an umbrella department, DOC has been working to merge its
divisions into one cohesive organization. The two primary divisions include:
• ADC – focused on public safety by providing incarcerated offenders a safe and humane
environment in which they can learn skills and take advantage of opportunities that will assist
them in their return to the community.
• ACC – focused on providing community and residential programming and services that
support behavioral change in a cost efficient manner for offenders on probation and parole.
DOC’s divisions differ in their missions, culture, and approach, which has created challenges. The
divisions largely function independently, despite a need for greater collaboration to maximize use of
resources. These differences in organizational culture and operations impact how the divisions
function in a variety of ways, including in the areas of operationally and in the areas of data
management. As an example, within the area of offender reintegration, which is a primary function
and current priority for the umbrella DOC organization:
● Reentry and reintegration are often used interchangeably by practitioners and even
researchers. While the Department’s use of the terms is not in itself an issue, the varying
perspectives on what these terms mean across divisions creates inconsistent reintegration
practices.
● Arkansas statute requires that rearrest data be included in the recidivism definition, but DOC
does not collect rearrest data. Recidivism is measured and discussed differently across the
divisions and no program level recidivism data is collected.
● DOC uses eOMIS®, a software program used by corrections departments for managing
offenders. eOMIS® data collection is not uniform across and within divisions as staff are
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
instructed differently across prisons, offices, and residential facilities. Examples of variances
include:
o Program participation may be collected as enrolled, completed, or graduated with no
consistent definition of each category, creating data inconsistencies.
o eOMIS® includes multiple screens with similar demographic variables. One screen
requires the number of children in the family and another requires the number of
dependents. Children and dependents are not clearly defined and staff often use them
interchangeably, creating inconsistent data.
o When offenders complete a program and return to prison on a subsequent offense, a
high percentage of the time staff choose “OTHER” as the reason for reoffending because
this option allows the user to simply check a box instead of inputting the reason and this
results in incomplete and inaccurate data.
The U.S Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, developed four principles recommended
for data collection and information-sharing in corrections organizations to improve returns on state
and local corrections investments 4.
• Use national approaches in supporting interoperability. Research and implement global and
national policies and technical recommendations
• Use data to support informed justice and public-safety decision making by building
capabilities for managing, integrating, and analyzing vast amounts of information.
• Develop responsible information-sharing policies and practices by connecting networks and
systems with strong identity, access, and discovery capabilities.
• Develop information-sharing and collaboration approaches inclusive of input from all
involved stakeholders.
Rationale: Improving collaboration between ADC and ACC, as well as other existing state, federal,
and community programs, could help DOC better fulfill its mission and implementation of
programming. Creating deliberate mechanisms for collaboration through use of a dedicated staff,
adoption of common definitions and data collection protocols, improving data sharing, and use of
collaborative planning processes for reintegration programming could assist the Department in
meeting the needs of offenders returning to the community. These efforts align with the priorities of
the Board of Corrections and DOC Secretary in improving the communication and working
relationships within DOC divisions, as well as with community partners. Improving collaboration
methods will also better position DOC to make other desired program improvements including
analysis and implementation of other state best practices and improving collaboration with
community partners to leverage local resources.
4
U. S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, June 2016,
https://www.ojp.gov/library/publications/promising-practices-use-data-and-justice-information-sharing-
self-evaluation
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Implementation Considerations:
Attachment A – DOC Work Plan provides the action steps in the planned sequence for
implementation of this initiative. Considerations for the implementation process were identified
through interviews and work sessions with DOC staff and review of best practices research.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
● DOC has recently created and hired the Assistant Director of Programming and
Reintegration, housed in the DOC Secretary’s office. This position will serve as a deliberate
point of responsibility within the organization’s structure and will support ongoing cross-
department coordination for offenders returning to the community. Duties will include
maintaining consistency and continuity of reintegration processes across all divisions,
including adoption of common data definition and capture requirements.
● Barriers in data sharing between internal divisions/or DOC and external partners prevent
collaboration. Data collection within DOC is inconsistent. There is no one central location for
data regarding resources available in individual communities either within DOC or other
human services providers. There may be confidentiality issues with data sharing for some
entities. DOC, in collaboration with their partners and TSS, can plan to explore data sharing
programs/formats and determine the most feasible and cost-effective approach for secure
data sharing.
Planned steps for establishing improved collaboration between DOC and external partners
(future state):
● The Assistant Director of Programming and Reintegration, located in the DOC Secretary’s
Office, will oversee programming consistency within and across divisions of DOC in an effort
to enhance collaboration with external partners.
● The Assistant Director of Programming and Reintegration will take the lead on developing or
improving relationships with other stakeholders. Those stakeholders include, but are not
limited to the following:
○ Arkansas Agencies/Departments - Commerce (Workforce), Education, Fair Housing
Commission, Finance and Administration (Motor Vehicles), Health, Human Services,
Transformation and Shared Services, Workforce Cabinet
○ Federal Agencies/Departments - Health and Human Services, Housing, Labor, Social
Security Administration
○ Local Community Resources - Non-profits, churches, food banks, Goodwill
Industries, thrift stores, volunteers, mentors
● Develop performance indicators at program level as one overall recidivism number does not
inform which programs are successful.
● Request and negotiate assistance from TSS to expand the existing data hub, a state repository
for information sharing across all Departments, to include resources for this initiative.
● Data sharing can inform the user of state and federal funding available for offender
community programming. DOC can research and apply for federal grants to assist with costs
of implementing/expanding the data sharing process.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
● Research existing data sharing products that allow corrections agencies to safely and
securely share data with community resource entities. Data sharing capabilities can provide
a listing of resources in each community and help determine which offenders are eligible for
the services available in his/her community.
● Establish proper training for those inputting the data to make sure it is entered properly.
(e.g., do not allow user to enter " other" in re-arrest information and train them to properly
list what the arrest was so the data is accurate).
Process changes associated with implementing changes in the strategic plans:
This initiative will impact both ADC and ACC as it will create a unified process for locating and making
use of community-based resources for offenders. After collaboration and data-sharing is achieved,
it is anticipated that the Assistant Director of Programming and Reintegration, along with the DOC
Secretary, will develop a unified process for seeking resources and making referrals for offenders
leaving incarceration and those on community supervision.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
The expected impacts of this initiative are to improve collaboration and data sharing with internal and
external stakeholders and partners. In order to measure the impact of this initiative, a variety of
performance indicators will be considered:
• Number of agencies and community organizations per month participating in collaboration
(expected to increase);
• Number of agencies and community organizations per month participating in data sharing
(expected to increase);
• Number of referral resources/programs available to offenders per month (expected to
increase); and,
• Number of communities across the state participating in the collaboration process (expected
to increase).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: This initiative seeks to improve the effectiveness of existing programming
at DOC. This will require collaboration with TSS regarding the data hub. If there are any additional
costs to the project, it is anticipated they would be shared by the departments.
Change Management Plan: This initiative may include establishment of uniform processes.
Clear communication with staff about the purpose for the changes will accompany any information
on the new process changes. The primary changes contemplated in this initiative are likely to require
significant external change management. DOC may expand collaboration with its key partners and
stakeholders on the reintegration process and on its internal prioritization of improving reintegration
and potentially improving recidivism outcomes. Key activities and timing for the communication plan
are included in Appendix A – DOC Work Plan and in Figure 17.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Figure 17 – DOC-07 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner
Transformation and DOC would like to Discussion with TSS DOC Secretary,
Shared Services increase data sharing leadership to Assistant Director of
capabilities with external request/negotiate data Programming and
partners to improve hub expansion for this Reintegration
resource utilization. purpose
Entity Partners DOC would like to Meeting with Workforce Assistant Director of
partner with you to Cabinet, meetings with Programming and
enhance collaboration other Department Reintegration
and data sharing to partners
increase resource
utilization.
Managers/Supervisors DOC is partnering with Initial kick-off meeting, DOC Secretary, Chief
external partners to training, ongoing of Staff, Assistant
increase resource reinforcement through Director of
utilization. Your role is to check-ins, performance Programming and
ensure staff receive assessment Reintegration
information necessary to
implement this process.
Affected staff DOC is partnering with Initial kick-off meeting, DOC Secretary, Chief
external partners to training, ongoing of Staff, Assistant
increase resource reinforcement through Director of
utilization. Your role is to check-ins, performance Programming and
communicate with assessment Reintegration
providers to ensure
offenders have access to
additional resources.
Offenders DOC is partnering with Announcement to Managers,
external partners to offenders, explanation of Supervisors, Affected
increase offender changes, ongoing Staff
resource utilization. reinforcement
Advocacy groups, DOC would like to Social Media Assistant Director of
volunteers, mentors partner with you to Programming and
enhance collaboration Reintegration
and data sharing to
increase resource
utilization.
DOC-08: Improve data quality and processes
This initiative directs DOC to review its internal data needs, usage, and data governance processes.
Initiative Overview and Current State: DOC has several challenges and opportunities
related to data management. Some divisions such as the Division of Community Correction rely
more heavily on management reports, but use across divisions is uneven. Data analysis is limited;
predictive analytics and statistical modeling is not utilized. Existing reporting is mainly focused on
mandatory requirements.
The system used to store offender data, “eOMIS®” (electronic offender management information
system) was implemented in the 1980s and transitioned to a web-based format. While the system
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
captures a wide variety of data fields, DOC leadership expressed concerns about the data quality
issues such as:
• Duplicate records (for example two records for the same person, e.g., if John Smith and John
Smith Junior are in the database as two offenders when it is a single offender, he would be
counted twice);
• Inconsistencies in understanding certain fields;
• Inconsistencies in data format (for example demographic data such as date of birth being
entered as a 1 or 2 digit month/1 or 2 digit day/4 or 2-digit year); and,
• Incomplete information where fields are not required to be entered and are sometimes left
blank.
Rationale: DOC-08 is primarily focused on improving the quality of data. DOC plans to task IT
leaders with an analysis of data quality and a clean-up of the data (e.g., identify and merge
duplications, standardize data definitions, remediate data format issues, populate blank fields as
appropriate). In a parallel effort, IT leadership can analyze the eOMIS® system to determine where to
insert data integrity features. Improvements are already in-process including to incorporate:
• Input controls: Use controls like drop-down lists, checkboxes, radio buttons, or sliders to
limit the choices and prevent invalid inputs. Text fields, numeric keyboards, and date pickers
can also specify the expected input format and length.
• Validation rules: Ensure each field has defined the acceptable values and formats for
specific data fields. For example, a rule can ensure that a date field is entered in the correct
format or that a numeric field falls within a specified range.
• Automated validation checks: Set up checks to ensure that the data entered meets specific
criteria or formats. These checks can flag discrepancies instantly, helping to identify and
rectify errors promptly.
This effort is centered on optimizing how data is used to enhance administrative efficiency, track
outcomes, and reduce errors. Key action steps include:
• Establish a department-wide data dictionary/code book and ensuring consistent data entry
across all units;
• Perform a data quality analysis to check for areas of data inaccuracy/incompleteness; if
areas are discovered, develop a plan for remediation;
• Implement data input controls for eOMIS® to improve the quality of data moving forward; and,
• Adopting practices for data usage, organizing and assessing the sufficiency of collected data.
This plan directly addresses several current state challenges, such as the lack of quality in legacy
data, a user interface that lacks data validation controls, inconsistent data entry practices, and the
outdated eOMIS® system, which primarily supports frequency reporting rather than predictive
analytics. DOC must establish a department-wide data dictionary/code book and ensure
appropriate user data entry and validation controls as well as consistent data entry across all units.
DOC will plan to conduct a data quality analysis.
Implementation Considerations:
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
To fully realize the benefits of becoming a data-driven organization, DOC must invest in building data
analytics capabilities among staff. Addressing data governance through strict policies and regular
audits will help maintain the accuracy and reliability of reported data.
Training employees in data visualization tools and assigning ownership of specific metrics will foster
a culture of accountability and continuous improvement. Committing to a multi-year journey for
developing and refining a performance framework will enable DOC to evolve its data practices and
adapt to changing needs over time. By following these best practices, DOC can create a data
infrastructure that enhances operational efficiency, improves decision-making, and supports better
outcomes for all stakeholders involved.
Strategies to address potential risks and enable success:
In a work session with DOC staff, challenges in implementing improved data use were identified
(shown in Figure 18 in red). Staff brainstormed solutions for each of these barriers (in green).
Figure18 – DOC-08 Interference Diagram
Source: Developed in work session with DOC staff held on September 4, 2024.
Two primary risks were identified:
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
• Budget constraints make it difficult to maintain and request updates to eOMIS®. Updates to
eOMIS® are expensive and time-consuming to make changes that would improve data quality
and usage. There may be some system limitations that cannot be addressed.
• In some areas data quality is low, and some data is often not entered, or certain field values
do not exist. Engaging staff in correct data entry will be challenging. Staff do not always
respect how important the data is and know how it will be used. Training and communication
around the “why” behind this initiative will be important to support this change.
Planned steps for establishing the future state:
• Obtain the funding to update eOMIS® to collect data and improve the quality of the data.
• Identify best practices for Corrections data usage.
• Conduct sessions with DOC leaders by division to define key performance indicators, data
sources, and methodologies (prioritizing automation if possible). Prioritize data collection
based on the eOMIS® that is known to be more accurate and reliable.
• Leadership will set targets/goals for measures as applicable and assign owners for each
measure.
• Identify a project manager to support the project.
• The IT team will plan to create a project plan to analyze data quality and target data for
cleaning (e.g., identify and merge duplicates, remediate inconsistencies, standardize data,
populate blank fields as appropriate, etc.). The IT team will implement the plan and clean
the data.
• The IT team can identify input controls and implement the input controls so that new data is
entered accurately and consistently.
• Develop training for staff entering data.
• Develop and execute communication plan.
• Develop data usage training for leadership and reinforce on an ongoing basis.
• Create shared work stations to enable staff without assigned computers to participate in data
entry/review (staff identified process improvement).
Alignment of Department priorities with staffing and resources: To ensure its
success, the department must allocate additional resources, as data analytics initiatives heavily
depend on both hardware and software capabilities. Funding updates and improvements to eOMIS®
and other tools will enable the collection, analysis, and utilization of high-quality data. Staff training
for those entering data and leaders will be important for the long-term success of this initiative.
Process changes associated with implementing changes:
Changes that impact the process directly:
• Update contract to address prioritization issues
• Adjust process to ensure that both divisions use the system the same way
• Implement eOMIS® input controls that will improve data quality going forward
Changes that positively impact the process, indirectly:
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
• Training and Development:
o Provide ongoing staff training on data entry, data quality, and research usage.
o Utilize Camtasia for effective training and credit.
o Cross-train staff for peak support.
• Technology:
o Install kiosk computers (or shared work stations) in control centers to allow staff who
do not have assigned computers to participate in data entry and/or review.
• Process Improvement:
o Implement more frequent menu updates.
o Ensure consistent system usage across divisions through use of input controls.
• Resource Allocation:
o Dedicate funds for data integrity and reporting.
o Apply for grants to support data initiatives.
o Consider hiring additional data-focused staff to assist with data stewardship.
• Contract Review:
o Reexamine Marquis' contract responsibilities.
o Update contract to address prioritization issues.
Performance metrics to measure success post-implementation:
• Data Entry Accuracy Rate (expected to increase);
• Data Quality as measured by elimination of duplication, implementation of standardized
data definitions and formats, enforcement of data entered into required fields;
• Ad hoc data requests (expected to decrease); and,
• Data requested response time (expected to decrease).
Identification and estimation of any savings the strategic plan could realize
once implemented: The success of the initiative could result in several types of savings across
the Department of Corrections:
Labor Savings: By reducing manual data entry errors, staff will spend less time on administrative
tasks like scrubbing and correcting data. This would free up employee time for more strategic tasks,
effectively increasing productivity without increasing staff size. For instance, cross-training staff and
reducing double-entry could directly lead to lower operational costs through more efficient use of
human resources.
Cost Avoidance: By implementing data controls (e.g., drop down menus, standardized definitions
and formats, required fields, etc.) DOC can ensure the integrity of their data moving forward and
avoid costly issues that arise from inaccurate and incomplete data.
Vendor Contract Optimization: Improvements in how DOC manages data and interacts with
systems like eOMIS® could result in more efficient usage of external vendors. If fewer manual
updates or fewer custom requests are required, or if a more streamlined contract is negotiated, the
department could reduce the expenses associated with maintenance, updates, and training.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Training and Onboarding Savings: The creation of agency-wide data standards, including a data
dictionary/code book for data entry, will reduce training time for new staff and decrease errors from
inconsistent data entry practices. Streamlined training programs that focus on these standards
could lower the cost of onboarding and retraining employees.
Change Management Plan: The primary areas of focus for change management are described
below.
• Resistance to Change from Staff: Staff members may be reluctant to adopt new data
practices due to discomfort with new processes or concern about their benefits. Regular
feedback sessions and incremental implementation can also help ease the transition.
• Staffing and Training Constraints: Limited staffing and time for comprehensive training can
delay or reduce the effectiveness of the initiative. Current staffing shortages, as well as a lack
of time to dedicate to learning new systems, could pose a barrier. Implement cross-training
among staff to allow for flexibility during peak times, and schedule training during slower
periods. Use digital tools such as video training modules (e.g., Camtasia screen recordings)
that staff can access at their convenience. Creating a phased rollout could also allow staff to
gradually adapt without overwhelming them.
• Vendor Dependency and Technology Limitations: DOC is reliant on external vendors for
updates to eOMIS®, which can be costly and take some time to complete. This could hinder
the flexibility and scalability of data improvements. Consider applying for grants to fund
technology upgrades.
Recommended communication plan tasks, including messaging and modalities are included for
each audience, are provided in Figure 19. Key activities and timing for communication plan are
included in Appendix A – DOC Work Plan.
Figure 19 – DOC-08 Communication Plan
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
DOC management • DOC is undertaking a data clean • Townhall • Secretary
staff up project to improve data meetings. • Division leaders
quality. As part of this effort, • Management • Quality improvement
new input controls will be staff emails. and program
implemented for eOMIS®. Staff evaluation Lead
who input data will receive • eOmis Lead
training on the new input
features.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Audience Key Messages Modalities Owner(s)
DOC staff • DOC is embarking on a major • Townhall • Division leaders and
new project to improve use of meetings. all managers
data to drive decisions. • Management • Quality improvement
• Everyone has a role in this staff emails. and program
effort, as accurate and • Ongoing evaluation Lead
complete data is the foundation team • eOmis Lead
of this project. meetings.
• Discuss the data
dictionary/code book effort to
help standardize data entry and
plans for quality assurance.
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DOC Strategic Management Plan Final 11/21/2024
Mitigation approaches for change management risks (4/4)
Promoting development and performance
Reinforcement with formal mechanisms
• Semi-annual performance evaluation “calibration” meetings are established at enterprise, department, and division-levels
to ensure rigor and consistency in performance evaluations, supported by new data collection and analysis
• Explicit expectation is included in leadership training for all supervisors to be responsible for their team’s professional
development and rigorous performance reviews, including feedback
• Expectation is reinforced for leaders to be holding regular development dialogues (e.g., through surveys, progress
updates)
• New process for team members are established to provide upward feedback on their supervisors’ development coaching
(e.g., digital feedback tools)
• New norms are established that no supervisor will be promoted or receive performance reward if they do not meet
minimum standards for supporting teams’ professional development
• New awards and recognition programs are established for exemplary leaders (e.g., quarterly award for best supervisor
coach)
• Quality of professional development (e.g., through surveys, training impact, department KPIs) is tracked
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All initiatives master tracker
Current as of 10/16/2024
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
Take action on manager roles and team size to target appropriate spans of control for
functions and management archetypes to more effectively deliver on the
F1 Streamline organization and improve role Optimize manager roles and team size for better departmental mission, specifically for AEDC, Arksansas Workforce Connection, ARS, 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
High priority Wave 1 ACOMM-0 D. Operational excellence clarity control and efficiency Insurance, and Re-employment Commerce Accountable Department Prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Streamline recruitment strategy and careers Develop a streamlined recruitment strategy and careers website that accelerates the 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-1 A. Personnel system website hiring cycle and enhances our competitive edge Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Initiate regular self-assessments to meet NAIC standards and adopt artificial
intelligence solutions to streamline compliance and reporting processes, thus 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-10 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff Adopt AI solutions for compliance and reporting maintaining high standards of regulatory adherence Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Launch initiatives that remove procedural barriers for customers, including the
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including adoption of pre-filled forms and streamlined online service portals that reduce
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-11 D. Operational excellence through digitization Remove procedural barriers for customers processing time and enhance user satisfaction Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Deploy an IVR system that guides users through a series of options to resolve their
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including inquiries independently, reducing wait times and increasing efficiency of call center 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-12 D. Operational excellence through digitization Deploy IVR system for call center efficiency operations Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Revamp our highly variable website pages with intuitive design and accessibility
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Revamp website design for accessibility and self- features that ensure all residents, regardless of technical skill, can find information 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-13 D. Operational excellence through digitization service and services quickly and easily in a self-service manner Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 4. 500k-1M citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Design a comprehensive training program for DWS employees that includes 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-14 D. Operational excellence tools Develop training program for DWS employees performance management and continuous improvement Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Finalize the upgrade of the UI Mod project to enhance its efficiency and user-
E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through friendliness, while looking for further areas to streamline processes and cut expenses 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-15 E. Core tech modernization management and modernization Finalize UI Mod & cut expenses with DIS in collaboration with DIS Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Speed up lead identification, prioritize high-probability leads, understand what drives
E4 Build new capabilities including cybersecurity lead conversion, and improve outcomes and lower cost for ADFA and AEDC through 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-16 E. Core tech modernization and analytics Improve lead identification and conversion analytics Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Based on prioritized content from "most common call type action plan", enhance
citizen access to information and assistance by integrating a chatbot system
proficient in autonomously resolving user inquiries
i. Identify the typical questions and topics where a chatbot system could be beneficial
ii. Develop specifications for a chatbot based on best practices in public and private
sector, and determine build-vs-buy decision.
Improve citizen access to information with chatbot iii. Integrate the chatbot system into the infrastructure of department websites, and 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-17 F. Agile organization F3 Optimize shared service delivery system continuously iterate on the system by updating its knowledge base Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Collaborate with NASAA to ease administrative Collaborate with NASAA to ease administrative burdens on issuers through improved 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-18 E. Core tech modernization management and modernization burdens on issuers technologies Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Partner with universities, local groups, and Partner with universities, local groups, and investors to promote business growth and Multi-Department (listed in 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-19 F. Agile organization F2 Improve collaboration among agencies investors to promote business growth entrepreneurship using the State Small Business Credit Initiative Commerce Initiative Description) Not prioritized 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Redefine job descriptions to align with organizational goals and implement digital
D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity tools that automate routine tasks, thereby increasing customer satisfaction and 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-2 D. Operational excellence tools Redefine job descriptions and automate tasks operational efficiency Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 5. 1M+ citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Review grant funds across the department to determine whether they align with the
goals of the state, provide direction on what type of priorities grants should be
supporting, and create standard processes and consider shared functions for grant
Strengthen and standardize grant management monitoring to ensure subgrantees are using grant funds as agreed to reduce grant 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-20 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees practices to improv the ROI of grants fraud and increase grant compliance Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Diagnose and create an action plan to more efficiently address primary call reasons
for DWS. Document most common call types and reasons through data analysis and
CSR observation (manual or automated). Evaluate most effective/efficient resolution
Create standardized procedures to improve for each (e.g., streamline web applications, clarify notices, improve website UX,
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including customer satisfaction within defined business days integrate chatbots, enhance IVR, adjust processes, and improve training program for 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 ACOMM-21 D. Operational excellence through digitization in Commerce’s call centers in Re-employment staff). Develop action plan. Commerce Accountable Department Prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Deploy push notifications for relevant and timely Examine the most commonly requested information from ACOM services and deploy 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-22 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff information to citizens push notifications to provide relevant and timely information to citizens Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 4. 500k-1M citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 4. Unfamiliar immediately)
Optimize AEDC functional ownership by Optimize AEDC functional ownership by determining which aspect of the AEDC
determining which existing teams should be part of should operate as part of Workforce Connection and transfer the management of the 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
High priority Wave 1 ACOMM-23 D. Operational excellence F2 Improve collaboration among agencies Workforce Connection and ADFA bond guarantee program from AEDC to ADFA Commerce Accountable Department Prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Consolidate HR to a central hub that uses automated systems for employee records
Consolidate HR to a central hub that uses and payroll processing, ensuring compliance and transparency to reduce over-
automated systems to reduce over-processing and processing and inefficiency, and fix processes to drive more effective recruitment 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 ACOMM-24 D. Operational excellence F3 Optimize shared service delivery inefficiency strategies to enhance ACOM's competitive edge Commerce Accountable Department Prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Effectively integrate the Banking and Securities
teams to most effectively leverage the strengths of Effectively integrate the Banking and Securities teams to most effectively leverage 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
High priority Wave 1 ACOMM-25 D. Operational excellence F2 Improve collaboration among agencies both orgs the strengths of both orgs and reduce lost time and inefficiencies Commerce Accountable Department Prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Coordinate assessment and de-prioritization of non-critical or non-urgent current and
Coordinate assessment and de-prioritization of non- upcoming projects in all departments
E1 Reduce volume of work in application and critical or non-urgent current and upcoming IT Projects could be classified based on a set of targeted questions that can include but 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-26 E. Core tech modernization project pipeline projects are not limited to: business criticality, urgency, and federal / legislative mandate Commerce Enterprise Enterprise-wide 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Develop a performance framework that defines the
D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity customer base and establishes and tracks success Develop a performance framework that defines the customer base, establishes 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 ACOMM-27 F. Agile organization tools metrics success metrics, and tracks & mitigates underperformance to those metrics Commerce Accountable Department Prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Utilize predictive analytics to forecast service demand and dynamically adjust staffing
D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Utilize predictive analytics for optimal service levels and schedules to maintain optimal service delivery without overburdening 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-3 D. Operational excellence tools delivery resources Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 4. 500k-1M citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
Support DBA efforts to increase office occupancy and right-size total real estate
portfolio by:
1) Analyzing data on leased and owned properties (e.g., # of assigned personnel, # of
total seats)
C. Asset optimization & Collaborate with DBA to reduce footprint and 2) Participating in strategic planning exercises
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-33 capital expenditures C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate increase departmental consolidation 3) Collaborating with DBA to reduce footprint Commerce Enterprise Enterprise-wide 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business critical or duplicative
applications across all departments. Could be accomplished in a phased approach:
i. Initial assessment with CIOs to gather application data and walk through
assessment criteria e.g., business criticality
ii. Department-internal exercises supported by TSS to identify and finalize candidate
applications
Coordinate identification and retirement of non- iii. Sunset plan and timeline for each application
E1 Reduce volume of work in application and business critical/duplicative applications across all iv. Value tracking and capture for resources (e.g., reduction or reinvestment of 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
High priority Wave 1 ACOMM-5 E. Core tech modernization project pipeline divisions of Commerce contract hours) Commerce Enterprise Enterprise-wide 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Identify patterns of fraud and abuse in DWS (specifically, unemployment benefits)
E4 Build new capabilities including cybersecurity more effectively through detection software and machine learning algorithms,
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-6 E. Core tech modernization and analytics Identify fraud and abuse through detection software reducing financial losses and improving trust in public services Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 5. 1M+ citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
Develop an internal Commerce shared service IT team to create IT standards for the
Department, develop a comprehensive application inventory across divisions,
evaluate opportunities for cost savings and shared use, establish cross-functional
E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Develop an internal IT shared services team to collaboration to provide improved support services, and ensure cyber security
High priority Wave 1 ACOMM-7 E. Core tech modernization management and modernization provide improved support and unified standards standards are upheld Commerce Accountable Department Prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
Consolidate financial operations to a central hub Consolidate financial operations to a central hub that uses automated systems for
that uses automated systems for budget tracking budget tracking and expense management, ensuring fiscal discipline and cost 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 ACOMM-8 F. Agile organization F3 Optimize shared service delivery and expense management transparency within departments Commerce Accountable Department Prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Create a unified marketing division within the Department of Commerce that
Create unified marketing division for cross- leverages cross-functional teams for project management, using data-driven 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 ACOMM-9 F. Agile organization F3 Optimize shared service delivery functional teams strategies to increase reach and impact of our marketing efforts Commerce Accountable Department Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
High priority ADE-0 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Optimize manager roles and team size for better As the overarching leader for the Agile Organization initiative, oversee Education Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
clarity control and efficiency implementation of a tailored and modernized organization (including managing immediately)
initiative sub-charters) to ensure effective distribution of management responsibilities,
enhanced operational efficiency, and improved role clarity among managerial
Wave 1 positions Prioritized
High priority ADE-10 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Collaborate with DBA to reduce footprint and Support DBA efforts to increase Little Rock office occupancy and right-size total real Education Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
capital expenditures increase departmental consolidation by end of 2024 estate portfolio by: immediately)
1) Analyzing data on leased and owned properties (e.g., # of assigned personnel, # of
total seats)
2) Participating in strategic planning exercises
3) Collaborating with DBA to reduce footprint
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority ADE-11 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Migrate to common IT platforms across divisions Migrate to a common IT platform across divisions to leverage economies of scale Education Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
management and modernization and improve coordination, quality, and productivity (e.g., accountability reporting immediately)
Wave 1 systems, assessment reporting systems) Not prioritized
High priority ADE-14 D. Operational excellence D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Revamp ADE's external communication strategy Redesign ADE’s communications strategy with external stakeholder groups (e.g., Education Accountable Department 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
tools for efficiency and impact by diagnosing current superintendents, parents) to ensure communications have the desired impact, while immediately)
issues and designing a future-state also improving the efficiency of how ADE sends communications today:
1. Diagnose the current state of communications sent by ADE today and identify
target audience pain points
2. Design the future-state based on pain points and gaps in the current approach
Wave 1 Prioritized
Medium priority ADE-15 A. Personnel A2 Establish best-in-class performance Streamline co-op pay scales Bring co-op pay scales and positions in line with state pay scales to ensure pay Education Multi-Department (listed in 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Wave 1 management systems equality. Initiative Description) Not prioritized immediately)
Medium priority ADE-16 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Simplify the hiring process Simplify the hiring process, including the hiring review justification process, the Education Multi-Department (listed in 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
system number of steps with OPM, and the ability to hire quality employees through Initiative Description) immediately)
pay/salary coding alliance, reducing department vacancies.
Wave 1 Not prioritized
High priority ADE-17 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Implement cross-training at ADE to 1) enhance task Introduce cross-training to 1) Ensure that more than one person knows how to do Education Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
system coverage and reduce delays, and 2) offer skill critical tasks at ADE, thereby reducing delays/hold-ups when they are out or at immediately)
development and career growth for employees capacity, and 2) provide motivated employees with opportunities to build their skill set
Wave 1 and advance in their careers at ADE Prioritized
High priority ADE-18 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Assess ADE's grades and positions to consolidate Education
system lower grades and hire fewer but higher-grade jobs,
Wave 1 ensuring talent sufficiency Prioritized
Lower priority ADE-2 D. Operational excellence D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Improve emergency response communications Design a system and process for immediate, emergency communications to be Education Accountable Department 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
tools disseminated to key stakeholders, thereby improving the safety of employees, unfamiliar immediately)
Wave 1 teachers, students, etc. Not prioritized
Medium priority ADE-21 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees Improve ADHE scholarship disbursements Create an automated system that leverages AI to review ADHE scholarship Education Accountable Department 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Wave 1 disbursements, reducing the number of state audits. Not prioritized immediately)
Medium priority ADE-22 D. Operational excellence D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Standardize operating procedures for internal ADE Standardized time consuming internal processes and policies (i.e., contract Education Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
tools processes processing, rental car/fleet usage, phone call routing, per diem calculations, immediately)
corporate purchasing cards, tax exempt purchasing) to give employees more time
Wave 1 back in their days. Not prioritized
Medium priority ADE-23 E. Core tech modernization E4 Build new capabilities including cybersecurity Offer Data as a Service (DaaS) Create a data lake to connect intelligence across ADE and offer that data back to Education Accountable Department 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
and analytics districts through cost sharing, reducing the amount districts spend on contractors who immediately)
Wave 1 query the data. Not prioritized
Lower priority ADE-24 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees Develop an integrated dashboard for districts to Create an internal, integrated dashboard that 1) brings all relevant data together in Education Accountable Department 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
centralize data, automate assessments, and one place for districts, 2) automates their needs assessments, and 3) allows divisions immediately)
enhance inter-division communication to communicate with each other and keep a historical log of actions, reducing the
time the state and districts spend on data review and monitoring.
Wave 1 Not prioritized
Medium priority ADE-25 D. Operational excellence D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Create an agency-wide rotation schedule to Design a new agency-wide rotation schedule/model to map out and coordinate district Education Accountable Department 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
tools organize district visits and improve issue visits over a 5-year period, and to improve the internal processes to escalate issues immediately)
escalation, reducing unnecessary visits. across divisions and programs, reducing potentially unnecessary district visits.
Wave 1 Not prioritized
Medium priority ADE-26 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees Establish processes for State Monitoring Support Design processes for four new State Monitoring Support Specialists to play a "case Education Accountable Department 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Specialists to act as district case managers, manager" role with districts by operating as their one-source-of-information across immediately)
enhancing the quality of support that districts ADE programs and by proactively coaching struggling districts, thereby improving the
Wave 1 receive quality of support that districts receive. Not prioritized
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
Medium priority ADE-27 D. Operational excellence D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Improve and standardize physical security practices Standardize and improve physical security practices across state buildings to ensure Education Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
tools across state buildings an efficient and safe experience for citizens and employees, addressing current immediately)
inconsistencies ranging from buildings with no security to those with tedious check-in
Wave 1 procedures. Not prioritized
Medium priority ADE-28 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees Strengthen and standardize grant management Review grants funds across the department to determine whether they align with the Education Accountable Department 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
practices to improve the ROI of grants goals of the state, provide direction on what types of priorities grants should be immediately)
supporting, and continuously monitor grants to ensure grantees are using funds as
Wave 1 agreed. Not prioritized
Medium priority ADE-29 E. Core tech modernization E1 Reduce volume of work in application and Coordinate assessment and de-prioritization of non- Coordinate assessment and de-prioritization of non-critical or non-urgent current and Education Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
project pipeline critical or non-urgent current and upcoming IT upcoming projects in all departments
projects
Projects could be classified based on a set of targeted questions that can include but
are not limited to: business criticality, urgency, and federal / legislative mandate
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority ADE-3 E. Core tech modernization E1 Reduce volume of work in application and Leverage AI to automate the first review of the AR Make two improvements to the AR App to 1) reduce the time ADE employees spend Education Accountable Department 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
project pipeline App on manual and tedious review, 2) reduce the time districts spend on completing immediately)
applications, and 3) improve all students' experience by ensuring coordination across
programs:
1. Develop and implement an in-house solution to bring the AR App, which is
currently in an excel spreadsheet, online
2. Leverage machine learning and AI to eliminate the first round of application review
that ADE employees do manually today, and to suggest potential district
improvement ideas for ADE employees to consider
Wave 1 Not prioritized
Medium priority ADE-30 F. Agile organization F3 Optimize shared service delivery Maximize value of shared services both within the Identify roles across organization serving transactional needs that could better serve Education Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
department and across state government agency through centralized departmental shared service, targeting cost effectiveness unfamiliar immediately)
and improved employee service levels, and implement priority changes
Wave 1 Not prioritized
Medium priority ADE-4 D. Operational excellence D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Improve data transparency for school decision- Make public data readily available with helpful visualizations and insights in one Education Accountable Department 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
through digitization makers place for education decision-makers (e.g., ADE staff, districts and school leaders, immediately)
families comparing schools, legislators, etc.), reducing the time stakeholders spend
searching for information.
Wave 1 Not prioritized
Lower priority ADE-5 D. Operational excellence D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Simplify educator licensing procedures Digitize the application process for educator licenses and limit number of excess Education Accountable Department 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
through digitization steps, reducing the processing time such that 90% of applications are processed
Wave 1 within 21 days Not prioritized
Medium priority ADE-6 F. Agile organization F2 Improve collaboration among agencies Collaborate with DHS and other departments to Partner with other departments to evaluate and improve how existing connected data Education Accountable Department 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 4. Unfamiliar
best support multi-system youth (e.g., SLDS data across early childhood, K-12, workforce) is being used, and develop
specific cross-departmental actions to improve the quality of care and supports that 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
multi-service youth receive from the state. immediately)
Wave 1 Not prioritized
Medium priority ADE-7 C. Asset optimization & C3 Allocate capital effectively Reinvigorate and elevate the role of co-ops to Reorganize and recategorize the 15 co-ops to be centers of excellence that better Education Accountable Department 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
capital expenditures proactively coach/support districts deliver on the mission of improving program efficiency and efficacy through immediately)
proactive, high-quality support services that will drive school improvement.
Wave 1 Not prioritized
Medium priority ADE-8 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees Redesign potentially redundant internal processes Redesign potentially redundant internal processes around reviewing and allocating Education Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
around reviewing and allocating grants in GMS grants in GMS, with the goal of reducing time employees spend in unnecessary immediately)
Wave 1 review. Not prioritized
High priority ADE-9 E. Core tech modernization E1 Reduce volume of work in application and Coordinate identification and retirement of non- Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business critical or duplicative Education Enterprise 0. 0 0. 0% 1. Familiar
project pipeline business critical/duplicative applications across all applications across all departments. Could be accomplished in a phased approach:
departments 1) Initial assessment to gather application data and walk through assessment criteria
(e.g., business criticality)
2) Identify and finalize candidate applications 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
3) Sunset plan and timeline for each application immediately)
4) Track value capture with TSS (e.g., reduction or reinvestment of contract hours)
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Take action on manager roles and team size to target appropriate spans of control for
F1 Streamline organization and improve role Optimize manager roles and team size for better function and management archetype to more effectively deliver on the departmental 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
High priority Wave 1 AG-0 F. Agile organization clarity control and efficiency mission Agriculture Accountable Department Prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Use marketing data to assess whether marketing spend that supports AR-produced
Assess ROI of marketing spend using data agricultural goods and services is effective and in-line with private sector benchmarks 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 AG-10 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees analytics Agriculture Accountable Department Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Review grant funds across the department to determine whether they align with the
goals of the state, provide direction on what type of priorities grants should be
supporting, and create standard processes and consider shared functions for grant
Strengthen and standardize grant management monitoring to ensure subgrantees are using grant funds as agreed to reduce grant 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 AG-11 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees practices to improv the ROI of grants fraud and increase grant compliance Agriculture Accountable Department Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Assign a liason to support DFA fleet initiatives (e.g., selling underutilized vehicles,
replacing vehicles at the right time to minimize total cost of ownership, consolidating
C. Asset optimization & toward a departmental and potentially state-wide vehicle pool) 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 AG-12 capital expenditures C1 Optimize fleet management Support enterprise fleet initiatives Agriculture Enterprise Enterprise-wide 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
C. Asset optimization & Multi-Department (listed in 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 AG-13 capital expenditures C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Improve land ownership and management Reduce overall land management costs by improving shared stewardship services. Agriculture Initiative Description) Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Support DBA efforts to increase Arkansas State office occupancy and right-size total
real estate portfolio by:
1) Analyzing data on leased and owned properties (e.g., # of assigned personnel, # of
total seats)
C. Asset optimization & Collaborate with DBA to reduce footprint and 2) Participating in strategic planning exercises
Lower priority Wave 1 AG-14 capital expenditures C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate increase departmental consolidation 3) Collaborating with DBA to reduce footprint Agriculture Enterprise Enterprise-wide 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Identify divisions and state programs (within and outside ADA) that deploy services
and programming at the county level and streamline delivery to improve citizen
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including experience and government efficiency 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 AG-15 D. Operational excellence through digitization Streamline delivery of county-level programming Agriculture Accountable Department Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Identify opportunities to automate or simplify processes within state testing labs, and 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 AG-16 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff Modernize state testing labs consider collaboration opportunities with labs in other state government departments Agriculture Accountable Department Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Identify roles across organization serving transactional needs that could better serve
Maximize value of shared services both within the agency through centralized departmental shared service, targeting cost effectiveness 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 AG-17 F. Agile organization F3 Optimize shared service delivery department and across state government and improved employee service levels, and implement priority changes Agriculture Accountable Department Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
Develop a two-year technology roadmap for the future of ADA which includes, at
minimum, AG-6, AG-7, and 7 additional medium-priority initiatives [AG-4, AG-8, AG-
9, AG-10, AG-11, AG-15, AG-16]. The critical deliverables of this initiative are: 1) A
detailed two-year implementation plan with action steps to incorporate the top 7-10 IT
projects defined by ADA leaders 2) A robust business case with estimates of
resources required to accomplish the two-year plan, and the resulting cost
efficiencies/ benefits 3) A plan to obtain approval for additional FTEs, contract labor,
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including or borrowed FTEs from other departments as necessary to accomplish roadmap 4) 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 AG-18 D. Operational excellence through digitization Build future technology roadmap for ADA Owners clearly defined for each action step Agriculture Accountable Department Prioritized 0. 0 0. 0% 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Optimize citizen interactions including web, call Map major citizen interactions across websites, call centers, and in-person visits and 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 AG-4 D. Operational excellence through digitization center, and in-person use resulting data to improve effectiveness/efficiency of citizen interactions Agriculture Accountable Department Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Develop a dashboard by [December 2024] for each ADA division that displays key
performance indicators and metrics related to program activities in real-time.
Examples of programmatic metrics include: 1) number of inspections completed 2)
licenses issued 3) violations issued 4) lab tests performed. The goal of the dashboard
Develop dashboard for Department of Agriculture is to enhance transparency, accountability, and effectiveness within the Department
to have greater clarity into key managerial metrics of Agriculture and its final intended use is joint use by both internal and external 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
High priority Wave 1 AG-6 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff and performance stakeholders Agriculture Accountable Department Prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Reduce labor hours spent on low value-added work by digitizing paperwork that is
Digitize Department paperwork for repetitive and burdensome and time consuming for department employees or citizens to complete 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
High priority Wave 1 AG-7 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff time-consuming operations today (e.g., contracts, purchase requisitions) Agriculture Accountable Department Prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Utilize predictive analytics to forecast service demand and dynamically adjust staffing
D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Utilize predictive analytics for optimal service levels and schedules to maintain optimal service delivery without overburdening 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 AG-8 D. Operational excellence tools delivery resources Agriculture Accountable Department Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Identify where ADA operates as a pass-through entity for data submission and
Automate data transfer between local and federal structure direct upload capability for local partners (e.g., EPA data from Plant 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 AG-9 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff partners Industries, grant pass-through) Agriculture Accountable Department Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
As the overarching leader for the Agile Organization initiative, oversee
implementation of a tailored and modernized organization (including managing
initiative sub-charters) to ensure effective distribution of management responsibilities,
F1 Streamline organization and improve role Optimize manager roles and team size for better enhanced operational efficiency, and improved role clarity among managerial Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DFA-0 F. Agile organization clarity control and efficiency positions Administration Accountable Department Prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Identify overlapping content areas through cross-training and develop training plans
A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent to equip teams to efficiently respond to citizen inquiries, resulting in a reduction in Finance & 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 DFA-1 A. Personnel system Cross-train for efficient citizen response response time and an increase in customer satisfaction over the next year Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 4. 500k-1M citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Over the next year, create user guides and FAQ documents, launch surveys, and
leverage call center data to develop a strategy to improve customers' experience
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including while using the online tax system, lower demand of support calls and improving the Finance & 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 DFA-10 D. Operational excellence through digitization Enhance online tax system experience employee experience as well Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 4. 500k-1M citizens 3. 15-25% (~5,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Develop and roll out auditor training program to taxpayer service representatives to
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Implement auditor training for taxpayer services to increase consistency in customer experience, educate citizens, and increase Finance &
High priority Wave 1 DFA-11 D. Operational excellence through digitization enhance cooperation collaboration between the two groups over the next three to six months Administration Accountable Department Prioritized 4. 500k-1M citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Map and digitize existing paper-based tax and DMV workflows to improve both
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including expediency of service delivery and improve employee operational efficiency over the Finance & 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 DFA-12 D. Operational excellence through digitization Digitize tax and DMV workflows next year Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 4. 500k-1M citizens 4. 25-50% (~10,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Assess previous tax guidance development to inform process improvements to Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-13 D. Operational excellence through digitization Improve tax guidance publication time reduce the time to publication for guidance on additional tax types Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Create single-sign on portal for licensing with features that enable direct
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Create a single-sign-on licensing portal with direct documentation upload to minimize paperwork and streamline and automate Finance & 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DFA-14 D. Operational excellence through digitization document upload application review Administration Accountable Department Prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Integrate automated chat system proficient in autonomously resolving user inquiries
to improve citizen access to information and assistance by integrating a chatbot
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Improve citizen access to information with chatbot system proficient in autonomously resolving user inquiries for the tax section over the Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-15 D. Operational excellence through digitization system next six months Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Partner with each cabinet call center manager to implement an advanced IVR
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including system, enabling AR citizens to autonomously resolve common questions and Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 DFA-16 D. Operational excellence through digitization Implement advanced IVR system improving the customer experience over the next six months Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Map key processes within DFA and identify pain points and bottlenecks, then
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Map DFA processes, identify issues, and improve implement process solutions and organizational changes that improve process times Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DFA-18 D. Operational excellence through digitization efficiency and satisfaction and customer satisfaction for SRO and DMV Administration Accountable Department Prioritized 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Investigate public and private sector capabilities, map key processes within the
division and relevant pain points, address bottlenecks and other process
improvement areas, and adapt the organizational structure to better accommodate
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including needed customer experience improvements in the tax division over the next six Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 DFA-19 D. Operational excellence through digitization Improve tax division processes months Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Implement the Executive Review Board to prioritize projects within the department
and track progress of all initiatives, resulting in an increase in project completion rate Finance &
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-2 D. Operational excellence F3 Optimize shared service delivery Establish Executive Review Board and a reduction in project delays over the next 3 months Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 0. 0 0. 0% 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Investigate public and private sector capabilities, map key processes within the
division and relevant pain points, address bottlenecks and other process
improvement areas, and adapt the organizational structure to better accommodate
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including needed customer experience improvements in the OCSE division over the next six Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-20 D. Operational excellence through digitization Enhance OCSE division processes months Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Investigate public and private sector capabilities, map key processes within the
division and relevant pain points, address bottlenecks and other process
improvement areas, and adapt the organizational structure to better accommodate
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including needed customer experience improvements in the regulatory division over the next Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-21 D. Operational excellence through digitization Optimize regulatory division processes six months Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Investigate public and private sector capabilities, map key processes within the
division and relevant pain points, address bottlenecks and other process
improvement areas, and adapt the organizational structure to better accommodate
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including needed customer experience improvements across all divisions over the next six Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-22 D. Operational excellence through digitization Streamline processes across divisions months Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 4. 25-50% (~10,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Assess issues with current call response process by mapping processes and
D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Overhaul call response with a trained team for interviewing employees and create a response management system made up of a Finance & 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DFA-23 D. Operational excellence tools faster solutions trained pool of individuals to provide consistent and quick solutions to callers Administration Accountable Department Prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
Develop a comprehensive skills enhancement program tailored to the specific needs
and roles of call center agents and in-person employees, providing ongoing training,
access to job aids, and performance management tools, resulting in a increase in
D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity employee satisfaction with training opportunities and an increase in call resolution Finance & Multi-Department (listed in 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-24 D. Operational excellence tools Call center skills enhancement program rate over the next six months Administration Initiative Description) Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Establish a feedback channel and response approach to collect and address
A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Establish a feedback system for employees to employee pain points to become a premier workplace in the state by employees Finance & 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DFA-25 A. Personnel system improve workplace conditions feeling heard and their working conditions improving over the next year Administration Accountable Department Prioritized 0. 0 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Develop performance metrics and reporting framework across major grant and
service programs to enhance transparency and accountability, ensure higher service
quality and cost effectiveness, consistently reporting on core performance metrics Finance & 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-26 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff Develop grant performance metrics over the next year Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Build managerial capabilities to monitor and drive performance of programs both in
DFA and across state government, increasing service level and cost effectiveness of
state government
- Integrate rigorous performance management into budgeting process by requiring
program evidence information, performance data, and budget to actuals in decision
making process
- Create system for aggregating and compiling budget spend data from all
departments into a centralized dashboard within each department and across the
state executive agencies as a whole
- Drive program performance and efficiency through ROI system, by integrating
performance data on programs across the organization Finance &
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-27 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees Drive performance with managerial capabilities Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 4. 500k-1M citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
Coordinate assessment and de-prioritization of non-critical or non-urgent current and
Coordinate assessment and de-prioritization of non- upcoming projects in all departments Projects could be classified based on a set of
E1 Reduce volume of work in application and critical or non-urgent current and upcoming IT targeted questions that can include but are not limited to: business criticality, Finance &
Medium priority Wave 1 DFA-28 E. Core tech modernization project pipeline projects urgency, and federal / legislative mandate Administration Enterprise Enterprise-wide 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Evaluate best-in-class options for detecting tax evasion and missed collections,
E4 Build new capabilities including cybersecurity investing in the best option for Arkansas, resulting in an increase in appropriate tax Finance & 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 DFA-29 E. Core tech modernization and analytics Detect tax evasion and missed collections revenue collection over the next year Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Expand DFAU to invest in emerging leaders for Expand DFAU model to identify and invest in high quality and emerging talent in the Finance &
High priority Wave 1 DFA-3 A. Personnel system future leadership department to develop the next generation of DFA leaders over the next 18 months Administration Accountable Department Prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
Facilitate ease of information sharing across department divisions by centralizing
data resources and reducing processing time with internal help-desk model to help
quickly locate and pull records, resulting in a reduction in time spent searching for
E4 Build new capabilities including cybersecurity information and an increase in data accuracy, improving operational efficiency over Finance & 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 DFA-30 E. Core tech modernization and analytics Centralize data resources the next year Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Consolidate legal functions across different divisions into a single department-level
F1 Streamline organization and improve role function that reports to the Chief of Staff and makes use of consistent policies, Finance &
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-31 F. Agile organization clarity Consolidate legal functions procedures, and allocation of responsibilities over the next 18 months Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
Centralize as many transactional (not dependent on close working relationship)
finance shared services under DFA as possible, eliminating redundant work and Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 DFA-32 F. Agile Organization F3 Optimize shared service delivery Centralize finance shared services streamlining across the state over the next six months Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 0. 0 0. 0% 1. Familiar immediately)
Create standard processes and consider shared functions for grant monitoring to
ensure federal grant opportunities are maximized, resulting in an increase of grant Finance & 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-33 G. Revenue opportunity G1 Federal funding opportunities Standardize grant monitoring processes applications and grant awards over the next year Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Create standard processes and consider shared functions for grant monitoring to
ensure subgrantees are using grant funds as agreed, resulting in a reduction in grant Finance & 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 DFA-34 G. Revenue opportunity G2 Grant opportunities Ensure subgrantee grant compliance fraud and an increase in grant compliance Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Expand Intergovernmental Services’ SPOC function to new grant-related services,
such as monitoring of subgrantees, guidance on NEPA, etc., resulting in an increase Finance & 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-35 F. Agile organization F3 Optimize shared service delivery Expand SPOC grant services in grant compliance and a reduction in grant fraud over the next year Administration Enterprise Enterprise-wide 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Review current processes around IT approval within Intergovernmental Services and
redesign any processes or standards to better support value from IT projects,
resulting in an increase in IT project success rate and a reduction in IT project costs Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-36 F. Agile organization F3 Optimize shared service delivery Redesign IT approval processes over the next six months Administration Enterprise Enterprise-wide 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Review organizational spans and layers for finance, legal, and procurement
personnel across various DFA divisions and consider centralizing relevant (most)
F1 Streamline organization and improve role roles across these functions, resulting in an increase in administrative efficiency over Finance & 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-37 F. Agile organization clarity Centralize administrative roles the next six months Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) unfamiliar immediately)
Investigate which grants across departments can be centralized vs. which grants
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Assess potential for centralizing grants within DFA should remain distributed within departments and coordinate migration if Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DFA-38 D. Operational excellence through digitization to improve compliance and increase efficiency recommended to increase efficiency and reduce duplicative efforts over the next year Administration Enterprise Enterprise-wide 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Establish procedures and approval hierarchies for use when determining whether
DFA resources and litigation are necessary for dispute resolution, resulting in a
F1 Streamline organization and improve role reduction in legal expenses and an increase in legal compliance over the next three Finance &
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-39 F. Agile organization clarity Establish legal approval procedures months Administration Enterprise Enterprise-wide 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Map the applicant journey to reduce the number of points of contact and steps
needed to publish job postings and improve standard processes for screening job
A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent postings across the organization, resulting in a reduction in time-to-hire and an Finance &
Medium priority Wave 1 DFA-4 A. Personnel system Streamline job posting process increase in qualified applicants over the next 18 months Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 1. Familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
Develop a mobile drivers license to pilot across the state that will reduce wait times at
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including DMV offices, increase customer satisfaction, and further digitize operations over the Finance &
Medium priority Wave 1 DFA-41 D. Operational excellence through digitization Pilot mobile drivers license next 18 months Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 5. 1M+ citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
Develop a government services online portal that serves as a centralized platform for
citizens to access a wide range of government services, such as applying for permits,
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including paying taxes, and accessing public records, increasing customer satisfaction and Finance &
Medium priority Wave 1 DFA-42 D. Operational excellence through digitization Create government services online portal reducing operational inefficiencies over the next 18 months Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 4. 500k-1M citizens 3. 15-25% (~5,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
Develop and implement an Appointment Scheduling Tool for DMV and Tax Call
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Centers to increase efficiency and improve customer experience over the next 18 Finance &
Medium priority Wave 1 DFA-43 D. Operational excellence through digitization Implement appointment scheduling tool months Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
Establish CX performance standards (polite, same day response, etc.) and train all
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Set and train DFA staff on CX standards for DFA employees on these expectations to ensure high quality customer service over Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DFA-44 D. Operational excellence through digitization superior customer service the next 6 months Administration Accountable Department Prioritized 4. 500k-1M citizens 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
Assess opportunity for implementing data-driven audits with the goal of increasing
E4 Build new capabilities including cybersecurity Asses opportunity for implementing data-driven efficiency in achieving compliance in current audit process through data-driven audit Finance & 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DFA-45 E. Core tech modernization and analytics audits selection and collections Administration Accountable Department Prioritized 5. 1M+ citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Create a grant writing center of excellence to sit within DFA that supports
departments in winning grant awards and reducing the burden of General Revenues Finance & 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DFA-46 F. Agile organization F2 Improve collaboration among agencies Create a grant writing center of excellence in funding state expenditures Administration Accountable Department Prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) unfamiliar immediately)
Collaborate with DBA to reduce footprint and increase departmental
consolidation"Support DBA efforts to increase Little Rock office occupancy and
right-size total real estate portfolio by:
1) Analyzing data on leased and owned properties (e.g., # of assigned personnel, # of
total seats)
C. Asset optimization & Collaborate with DBA to reduce footprint and 2) Participating in strategic planning exercises Finance &
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-47 capital expenditures C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate increase departmental consolidation 3) Collaborating with DBA to reduce footprint" Administration Enterprise Enterprise-wide 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Launch a shared job posting process and platform to reduce the number of points of
contact and steps needed to publish job postings and improve standard processes for
screening job postings across the organization, resulting in a reduction in time-to-hire Finance & Multi-Department (listed in
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-5 A. Personnel F3 Optimize shared service delivery Launch shared job posting platform and an increase in qualified applicants over the next 18 months Administration Initiative Description) Not prioritized 4. 500k-1M citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 4. Unfamiliar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
Develop an internship program that attracts and develops talent early through a
college internship program that translates a significant portion of the intern pool into
A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent full time employees enabling the state to become a premier workplace over the next Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Medium priority Wave 1 DFA-6 A. Personnel system Develop college internship program 6 months Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Establish a partnership with UALR and Pulaski Tech to enhance skills development,
resulting in an increase in employee participation in training programs and an
A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent increase in employee satisfaction with training opportunities enhancing the quality of Finance & 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DFA-7 A. Personnel system Partner with UALR and Pulaski Tech the DFA workforce over the next year Administration Accountable Department Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 3. 15-25% (~5,000) 5. Novel immediately)
Map current DMV processes to identify areas for improvement that could be
bolstered by targeted technology investments and then deploy those improvements
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Map and enhance DMV processes with tech to with the goal of reducing DMV process times and increasing quality of DMV service Finance & 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DFA-8 D. Operational excellence through digitization improve speed and service to Arkansans Administration Accountable Department Prioritized 4. 500k-1M citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Update DFA website to make answers to citizens' questions more easily and readily
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Update DFA website for easier access to tax available, and establish the 1) appropriate communication channels 2) cadence and Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DFA-9 D. Operational excellence through digitization information for citizens 3) format and 4) content to most effectively convey tax expectations to citizens Administration Accountable Department Prioritized 4. 500k-1M citizens 3. 15-25% (~5,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Coach other departments and DIS based on DHS Share best practices developed in DHS IT with other agencies to improve employee 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
DHS Ongoing Wave 1 DHS_113 E. Core tech modernization management and modernization IT excellence and citizen experience and cost effectiveness Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized >500k citizens >5,000 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
F1 Streamline organization and improve role Program implementation for programs moving to
DHS Ongoing Wave 1 DHS_151 F. Agile organization clarity DAABHS Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized
Implement Every Child Arkansas to increase civic Conduct recruiting push to increase supply of foster families and increase child
DHS Ongoing Wave 1 DHS_154 H. Department-specific lever None support for foster system placements, in support of Every Child Arkansas Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized
RFP for Substance Use Disorder (SUD) recovery
DHS Ongoing Wave 1 DHS_155 H. Department-specific lever H1. Network & contract innovation services Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized
Introduce novel payment models for Rx spend, such as Value based payments
Pursue value-based payment arrangements with (VBP), PMPM guarantees, and predictability contracts, to cover and pay for high-cost 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
DHS Ongoing Wave 1 DHS_44 H. Department-specific lever H1. Network & contract innovation drug manufacturers for certain high-cost drugs. drugs in a cost-effective manner. Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized 100k-500k citizens 0 1. Familiar immediately)
Introduce or strengthen Third Party Liability (TPL) / Review current TPL and subrogation practices and consider introducing or
subrogation practices and processes for all strengthening, either through internal capabilities or through specialized vendors, to 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
DHS Ongoing Wave 1 DHS_71 H. Department-specific lever H2. Payment integrity & subrogation members drive savings to Medicaid plan Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized 0 0 1. Familiar immediately)
Standardize pricing, rebates, and policies for Align and standardize pricing, rebates, and prior authorization policies for drugs like
certain Neupogen, Neulasta, Procrit, Epogen, and their biosimilar equivalents that can be
drugs that can either be self-administered or self-administered or administered in a clinic, in order to control pharmaceutical 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
DHS Ongoing Wave 1 DHS_83 H. Department-specific lever H1. Network & contract innovation administered in an outpatient clinic. spend. Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized 100k-500k citizens 1. Familiar immediately)
Procure mental health and substance abuse crisis Procure mental health and substance abuse crisis hub using ARP funds to centralize
hub to centralize resources for high risk and in- resources for high risk and in-crisis populations, improving beneficiary health
DHS Ongoing Wave 1 DHS_92 H. Department-specific lever H1. Network & contract innovation crisis populations outcomes and reducing high cost adverse events Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized <100k citizens 0 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Work with DMS to fully develop the HealthySteps program and integrate with Patient
Work with DMS to fully develop the HealthySteps Centered Medical Home. As part of this, a pediatricians organization has written a
program and integrate with Patient Centered grant for Healthy Steps (0-5 yo). Question remains on how to integrate all of the
DHS Ongoing Wave 1 DHS_93 H. Department-specific lever H1. Network & contract innovation Medical Home above into PCMHs. Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized <100k citizens 0-999 2. Somewhat familiar
OSAMH has changed Medicaid policy to allow PCPs to bill for services of MH
councelors to Medicaid. OSAMH is using a SAMHSA grant for BH and PCP
Implementing of policies and programs that integration and is in year 1 of 5 to apply and demonstrate collaborative care model;
integrate behavioral health services in primary care this requires PCPs to use a shared psychiatrist and trained care coordinators; project
DHS Ongoing Wave 1 DHS_95 H. Department-specific lever H1. Network & contract innovation clinics needs extensive training and support to be in place. Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized 100k-500k citizens 0-999 2. Somewhat familiar
Create central unit in DHS to oversee contracts and improve vendor management,
increasing ROI of DHS spending on contractors, and improving service outcomes for
customers.
> Contract oversight: update contract oversight system, monitor performance
guarantees, collect liquidated damages, confirmation of deliverables receipt
> Vendor management: map contractor and subcontractor responsibilities, escalate
vendor performance issues, pay for value instead of pay for volume
> Dependencies: standardize vendor contracts with OSP, establish recoupment
B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Establish DHS contract oversight and vendor mechanisms with DF&A to collect, allocate, and spend liquidated damages or other 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DHS-1 B. Procurement and value management unit contractor payments Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized 5. 1M+ citizens 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Review subscriptions and licenses to journals, publications, and associations across
Consolidate and improve value from subscriptions departments and divisions to determine if redundant subscriptions can be shared to 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-1 B. Procurement B1 Manage demand for vendors and support across divisions reduce overall spend. Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized 0 0-999 1. Familiar immediately)
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Streamline Medicaid eligibility and enrollment for Streamline eligibility and enrollment processes for maternal health prevention 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DHS-10 D. Operational excellence through digitization maternity care program Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
E1 Reduce volume of work in application and Coordinate assessment and de-prioritization of non-critical or non-urgent current and
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-1000 E. Core tech modernization project pipeline De-prioritize noncritical IT projects upcoming projects in all departments Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized 0. 0 0. 0% 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Support DBA efforts to increase Little Rock office occupancy and right-size total real
estate portfolio by:
1) Analyzing data on leased and owned properties (e.g., # of assigned personnel, # of
total seats)
C. Asset optimization & Collaborate with DBA to reduce footprint and 2) Participating in strategic planning exercises
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-1001 capital expenditures C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate increase departmental consolidation 3) Collaborating with DBA to reduce footprint Human Services Enterprise Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
Introduce trainings by DCO for community partners to improve awareness and
utilization of DCO and DHS resources and cross-referrals across programs,
improving intended citizen impact.
DCO gets lots of questions and requests from other agencies to train them and help
their clients; would aim get community entities more involved in what DCO does and
Introduce trainings with sister agencies to improve how to help people get connected to DCO. Could also include awareness of non-DHS 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-107 H. Department-specific lever H4. HUB - integrated customer experience cross-referrals resources in the community, e.g., non-profits, faith institutes, etc. Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized <100k citizens 0-999 1. Familiar immediately)
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Create online filing system for any agency taking Create online filing system to be used across all agencies taking appeals to improve 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-127 D. Operational excellence through digitization appeals internal coordination and citizen experience Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized <100k citizens 0-999 1. Familiar immediately)
B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Conduct trainings on grants and contract Conduct trainings with program leaders on best practices in grants and contract
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-135 B. Procurement and value management management to improve subgrantee and vendor compliance and program ROIs Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Coordinate policies and services with other Coordinate policies and services with other agencies to focus on Social Determinants 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-144 H. Department-specific lever H4. HUB - integrated customer experience agencies to focus on Social Determinants of Health of Health Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 0. 0% 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Build collaboration with DOC and Commerce to coordinate benefits for individuals 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-145 H. Department-specific lever H4. HUB - integrated customer experience CAA implementation into re-entry waivers exiting corrections Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 0. 0% 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Complete development of an Assisted Living Cost Develop Assisted Living Cost Reporting system to allow potential customers of 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-150 D. Operational excellence through digitization Reporting system DAABHS services to compare options for long-term support Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 0. 0% 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Redesign customer service capabilities and staffing model to more efficiently and
more seamlessly match DHS customers with appropriate services and support.
> Capabilities: IVR and chatbots, website, one-pagers, resource directory, walk-in
sites
> Staffing model: contractors, training / cross-training, virtual support model
> Efficiently: first contact resolution, shorter wait times, increased utilization of self-
service, lower staff-intensity
> Seamlessly: single CRM with data on all customer interactions, MOUs with other
agencies and community partners
Redesign customer service capabilities and > Services and support: all DHS programs, other state agencies, community-based 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DHS-2 H. Department-specific lever H4. HUB - integrated customer experience operating model organizations Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized 5. 1M+ citizens 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Review ongoing provider contract initiatives to eliminate those that are duplicative, or
do not appear to reward superior or improved performance, in order to reduce
B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Rationalize duplicative or low-impact provider unnecessary administrative and benefits expenses and/or improve provider 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-2 B. Procurement and value contract initiatives performance Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized >500k citizens 0-999 1. Familiar immediately)
Work with other AR state agencies such as DCFS, corrections, corrections, and
Develop MOU between the Division of Youth county judges to establish MOUs and improve data sharing, e.g., connecting DYS
Services and other AR state agencies and divisions systems to JJIS to ensure DYS is aware of all cases related to youth discharged from 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-200 H. Department-specific lever H4. HUB - integrated customer experience to improve timeliness and accessibility of services DYS Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Implement single Electronic Health Record (EHR) Move all state facilities to a single EHR system to improve patient care coordination 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-201 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff system for state facilities and service quality Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Integrate Purchasing and Procurement strategy for Integrate Purchasing and Procurement strategy for Medicaid, State Employees
Medicaid, State Employees Health and K-12 Health and K-12 School Based Health Insurance to coordinate input to the market, 3. Somewhat
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-21 B. Procurement B1 Manage demand for vendors and support School Based Health Insurance develop sustainable health insurance market intelligence, and reduce redundancies Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized 0 0 unfamiliar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
Strengthen independent administration of newly
F1 Streamline organization and improve role established Office of Substance Abuse and Mental Build out managerial and administrative capacity in newly independent OSAMH by 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-211 F. Agile organization clarity Health (OSAMH) growing senior leadership team and enhancing core functions. Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Increase awareness of HCBS through distribution of educational materials and
enhancements to customer service capabilities, community partnerships, and
communication channels to help beneficiaries make the right choice for their long-
term care options.
> Customer service capabilities: embed material in customer service centers, new
resource directory
> Community partnerships: share material through existing community partners;
reach out to build new partnerships, e.g., Arkansas AARP, PCPs, Schools, Higher
Education, AAAs, Walmart and other retail, Pharmacies
> Communication channels: distribute through public channels, such as websites,
social media
Increase awareness of Home & Community Based > Risk: legislative and industry stakeholders may push back if effort is explicitly 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DHS-3 H. Department-specific lever H3. Utilization management Services reducing reliance on long term care facilities Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized 3. 100k-500k citizens 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Provide institution transition of care services for Introduce transition of care management for key specialty conditions to support long- 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-32 H. Department-specific lever H1. Network & contract innovation patients exiting acute episodes term patient health outcomes and lower long-term plan costs Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized <100k citizens 0. 0% 1. Familiar immediately)
Restructure Medicaid operations with single appropriation to enable strategic
management of budget across Medicaid divisions and improve organizational
effectiveness and ability to develop and execute strategic priorities to advance
departmental mission.
F1 Streamline organization and improve role Restructure Medicaid operations under single > Restructure Medicaid operations: new office of Medicaid roles and responsibilities, 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DHS-4 F. Agile organization clarity appropriation new division of Medicaid Operations Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized 5. 1M+ citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Identify private sector urgent care health network with low-cost options and network
Expand network to private sector low-cost urgent breadth to expand care to Medicaid population, lowering health burden, improving 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-42 H. Department-specific lever H1. Network & contract innovation care clinics to expand access outcomes, and reducing costs from high-cost low-accuity treatment Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized >500k citizens 0 1. Familiar immediately)
Increase customer contact points in community settings with high volume of potential
beneficiaries and reduce lease and operating costs for low-volume office locations as
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Increase customer contact points in community practical. 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DHS-5 D. Operational excellence through digitization settings > Community settings: hospitals, clinics, community non-profits Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized 5. 1M+ citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Build data infrastructure and dashboards for state-owned facilities to improve
management visibility and support operational and strategic decisions, including
Improve management visibility into facilities through Electronic Health Records (EHR) across facilities with additional modules for 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-53 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff customer engagement through dashboards to support operations Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized <100k citizens 1,000-5,000 1. Familiar immediately)
Improve DHS customer online experience by Enhance Access Arkansas to allow single client login to access all DHS information
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including creating single login for all applications, claims, and (e.g., claims information, notices from MMIS) and take all required actions to manage 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-58 D. Operational excellence through digitization case information their DHS services, improving the customer experience Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized >500k citizens 0-999 1. Familiar immediately)
Identify funding opportunities not currently maximized in DHS and develop plans to
access funding to increase DHS program and service capacity and free up existing
GR funding for other state and departmental priorities.
> Funding opportunities: community pathways for Title IV-E, claiming for motivational 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DHS-6 G. Revenue opportunity G1. Federal funding opportunities Maximize federal funding opportunities interviewing training, braided/blended funding strategies Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
Strengthen program integrity and FWA functions by updating PI policies and
improving inter-agency FWA investigation collaboration to ensure appropriate care,
billing, and use of DHS program funds.
> PI policies: coordination of benefits for ALS patients enrolling in Medicare; claims
analysis and payment recoveries from MCOs; update PA policies and approval
processes; claims edits and reimbursement policies
> FWA investigation collaboration: DHS front-end guidance for DIG on policy-related
issues; IG timely flagging of potential claim coding fraud to enable DHS to quickly Multi-Department (listed in 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DHS-7 H. Department-specific lever H2. Payment integrity & FWA Strengthening Program Integrity & FWA Function update systems Human Services Initiative Description) Prioritized 5. 1M+ citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Introduce KPIs for child welfare services and Introduce KPIs and automated quality review process for child welfare services such
introduce automated continuous quality review to as case managers in order to ensure high quality service for areas with most critical
reduce negative CFSR findings that will require service levels and to reduce the time and resources required with negative CFSR 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-7 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees time and resources results Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Take action on manager roles and team size to target appropriate spans of control for
F1 Streamline organization and improve role Optimize spans and layers to improve function and management archetype to more effectively deliver on the departmental 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-72 F. Agile organization clarity organizational effectiveness mission. Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized >500k citizens 1,000-5,000 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Improve DHS’s ability to target and attract talent and to develop careers paths for
employees to improve the employee experience and continually develop skills
needed to deliver the best service to Arkansans.
> Target: skills demand forecasting, current skills assessments
> Attract: employee value proposition assessment, financial and non-financial
recruiting incentives, new sources of talent, more flexible hiring bonuses
> Develop career paths: Work with OPM to develop career paths within and across
departments to open up opportunities for advancement and enhance skills
development and sharing of best practices to improve overall experience and
effectiveness of AR state government
> Note on Scope: Would exclude certain healthcare and other facilities, with bespoke
needs, apart from food service or Certified Nursing Assistants which may be in
demand across multiple facilities and divisions
> Dependency: more flexible hiring bonuses may rely on changes to DHS
A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent appropriation language; may need to work with DF&A to understand how to access 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DHS-8 A. Personnel system Focus on talent targeting and career development performance pay budget Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized 0. 0 4. 25-50% (~10,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Combine non-emergency and day treatment transportation programs to be governed
Merge Non-emergency Transportation and Day by a single contract to reduce administrative burden and potentially save costs on
Treatment Transportation programs under one contract. Currently there are NET and day-transport for facilities that own fleets of 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-87 H. Department-specific lever H1. Network & contract innovation transportation contract. vans. Could reduce duplicative adminstrative costs and streamline hiring. Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized 100k-500k citizens 0. 0% 1. Familiar immediately)
Make PASSE organizations responsible for all
transportation service for beneficiaries enrolled in Shift transportation costs and administration to PASSE organizations to reduce state 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DHS-88 H. Department-specific lever H1. Network & contract innovation the PASSE program administrative and cost burden. Discussion is ongoing with PASSE. Human Services Accountable Department Not prioritized 100k-500k citizens 0. 0% 1. Familiar immediately)
Work with OPM to develop and deploy internal trainings across DHS and in some
cases across departments, delivered both in onboarding and through ongoing
programs to create opportunities for employees to develop skills crucial to delivering
best services to Arkansans:
> Internal trainings: Onboarding program, budget and appropriations process,
A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Deploy internal trainings for DHS and cross- Medicaid 101 & eligibility 101 trainings, motivational interviewing, position-specific 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DHS-9 A. Personnel system departmental staff trainings such as ‘how to be a government lawyer’ Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized 0. 0 4. 25-50% (~10,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
DDS is implementing tracking of key metrics based on report by Guidehouse on
employment recruitment and retention focused on HDCs; came up with 5 pillars
A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Implement organizational health tracking to ensure (WeHeart program) - currently setting baseline and what will be tracked for each of 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
DHS Ongoing Wave 1 DHS-98 A. Personnel system sustainability of DDS HDC personnel the pillars; Human Services Accountable Department Prioritized 0 0-999 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Develop and implement a triage process for sourcing and selecting cases to
investigate to improve the quality and outcomes of investigations and result in higher
Develop and implement a triage process to recoveries.
improve investigation quality, outcomes, and •Triage process: Internal guidelines and measurable metrics to guide investigators on 3. Somewhat
High priority Wave 1 DIG-1 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees recoveries competing priorities Inspector General Accountable Department Prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) unfamiliar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Use data/analytics to detect financial irregularities for further investigation rather than
relying primarily on referrals and complaints to improve timeliness and outcomes of
Use data/analytics to detect financial irregularities, investigations and result in higher recoveries.
improving investigation timeliness, outcomes, and •Data/analytics: use S4/HANA as opportunity to access new financial data; meet with
recoveries, reducing reliance on DIS to understand available data; build on OMIG practices; optimize use of tools like 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
High priority Wave 1 DIG-2 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees referrals/complaints Optum Inspector General Accountable Department Prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Take action on manager roles and team size to target appropriate spans of control for
F1 Streamline organization and improve role Optimize manager roles and team size for better functions and management archetypes to more effectively deliver on the 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DIG-3 F. Agile organization clarity control and efficiency departmental mission Inspector General Accountable Department Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Establish management services to support Establish management services to support managerial efficacy of other state 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DIG-4 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees managerial efficacy of other state agencies agencies Inspector General Accountable Department Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 0. 0% 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Develop performance metrics (e.g., KPIs) and
reporting framework to enhance performance
transparency to ensure accountability to Develop performance metrics (e.g., KPIs) and reporting framework to enhance 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DIG-5 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees stakeholders performance transparency to ensure accountability to stakeholders Inspector General Enterprise Enterprise-wide 2. 10k-100k citizens 0. 0% 1. Familiar immediately)
Define structure and streamlined process to handle Define structure and streamlined process to handle complaints, particularly across 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DIG-6 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees complaints, particularly across departments departments Inspector General Enterprise Enterprise-wide 1. <10k citizens 0. 0% 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Cross-train investigators across functions and with Multi-Department (listed in
Lower priority Wave 1 DIG-7 A. Personnel system State Police Cross-train investigators across functions and with State Police Inspector General Initiative Description) Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Develop audit repository within DIG to enhance Multi-Department (listed in 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 DIG-9 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees transparency Develop digital repository of audit activity and outcomes to enhance transparency Inspector General Initiative Description) Not prioritized 1. <10k citizens 0. 0% 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-1 B. Procurement B1 Manage demand for vendors and support Standardize specifications for IT commodities and Standardize specifications for IT commodities by determining most commonly TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
award state contracts for those purchases purchased technology products, rationalizing where certain products are exorbitant unfamiliar immediately)
(excludes software subscription) except in special cases, creating product specification policies, and conducting IFBs
for statewide contracts on products with those specifications
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-10 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Optimize contracts for long tail commodities Optimize contracts for long tail commodities by moving commonly purchased long TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Wave 1 management tail items purchased on P-cards to statewide contracts Enterprise-wide unfamiliar immediately)
High priority FUNC-11 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Optimize professional services contracts Optimize contracts for professional services by establishing best practices, TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 4. Unfamiliar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
Wave 1 management benchmarking rates, and building negotiation skills Enterprise-wide immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-12 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Optimize contracts for IT services Optimize contracts for IT services by establishing best practices, benchmarking rates, TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
Wave 1 management and building negotiation skills Enterprise-wide unfamiliar immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-13 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Optimize contracts for educational services Optimize contracts for educational services by establishing best practices, TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 4. Unfamiliar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Wave 1 management benchmarking rates, and building negotiation skills Enterprise-wide immediately)
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
Medium priority FUNC-14 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Optimize contracts for facilities management Optimize contracts for facilities management by establishing best practices, TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Wave 1 management benchmarking rates, and building negotiation skills Enterprise-wide immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-15 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Optimize contracts for administrative services Optimize contracts for administrative services by establishing best practices, TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Wave 1 management benchmarking rates, and building negotiation skills Enterprise-wide unfamiliar immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-16 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Optimize contracts for other (long tail) services Optimize contracts for other (long tail) services by establishing best practices, TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
Wave 1 management benchmarking rates, and building negotiation skills Enterprise-wide unfamiliar immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-17 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Deploy contract assessment system that leverages Deploy contract assessment system that leverages GenAI to monitor contract terms TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 4. Unfamiliar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
Wave 1 management GenAI and make recommendations for optimization Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-18 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Adopt TCO approach for IT commodities Adopt TCO approach for IT commodities and adjust invitation for bid (IFB) TSS Enterprise 0. 0 5. 50%+ (~10,000+) 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Wave 1 management assessment approach to include non-price cost elements Enterprise-wide unfamiliar immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-19 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Adopt TCO approach for rental / lease commodities Adopt TCO approach for rental / lease commodities and adjust invitation for bid (IFB) TSS Enterprise 0. 0 5. 50%+ (~10,000+) 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Wave 1 management assessment approach to include non-price cost elements Enterprise-wide unfamiliar immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-2 B. Procurement B1 Manage demand for vendors and support Rationalize demand for software subscriptions Rationalize demand for software subscriptions across the stateby identifying full body TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
across the state of software subscriptions across agencies and determine commonality among
vendors or products, rationalizing user licenses, and renegotiating price with vendors
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-20 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Adopt TCO approach for fleet Adopt TCO approach for fleet and adjust invitation for bid (IFB) assessment approach Finance & Enterprise 0. 0 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Wave 1 management to include non-price cost elements Administration Enterprise-wide unfamiliar immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-21 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Adopt TCO approach for equipment commodities Adopt TCO approach for equipment commodities and adjust invitation for bid (IFB) TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Wave 1 management assessment approach to include non-price cost elements Enterprise-wide unfamiliar immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-22 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Adopt TCO approach for long tail commodities Adopt TCO approach for long tail commodities and adjust invitation for bid (IFB) TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 4. Unfamiliar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
Wave 1 management assessment approach to include non-price cost elements Enterprise-wide immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-23 B. Procurement B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Optimize a consolidated vendor communication Optimize a consolidated vendor communication registry across all departments that TSS Enterprise 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
and value registry across all departments vendors can register on to reliably receive communications about all contracts out for immediately)
Wave 1 bid, not just statewide contracts Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-24 B. Procurement B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Reduce untraceable P-card spend Reduce untraceable spend through policy changes and issuance of additional P- TSS Enterprise 0. 0 5. 50%+ (~10,000+) 4. Unfamiliar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Wave 1 and value cards Enterprise-wide
High priority FUNC-25 B. Procurement B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Host an OSP roadshow for state departments Host an OSP roadshow for state departments to explain the role of OSP, support TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
and value OSP provides, how to navigate engaging with OSP, etc. and field feedback from
Wave 1 departments Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-26 B. Procurement B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Modify governance process for IT SaaS Modify governance process for IT SaaS subscriptions to require approval from DIS TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Wave 1 and value subscriptions and OSP Enterprise-wide
High priority FUNC-27 B. Procurement B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Modify governance process for statewide Modify governance process for statewide contracted commodities to require purchase TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
and value contracted commodities on contract, ultimately to leverage pooled demand and secure better rates
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-28 B. Procurement B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Establish structured contract terms database Establish structured contract terms database by using GenAI to move contract TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 4. Unfamiliar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Wave 1 and value language from unstructured files to consolidated database Enterprise-wide immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-29 B. Procurement B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Optimize spend data management practices Optimize data management practices by designating a central authority for data TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
and value management practices; making product categories and vendor classification unfamiliar immediately)
consistent across all state agencies; applying product and vendor taxonomy to P-card
spend and incorporating P-card spend into total spend analytics
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-3 B. Procurement B1 Manage demand for vendors and support Standardize specifications for equipment and Standardize specifications for equipment by determining most commonly purchased TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
award state contracts for those purchases technology products, rationalizing where certain products are exorbitant except in unfamiliar immediately)
special cases, creating product specification policies, and conducting IFBs for
statewide contracts on products with those specifications
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-30 B. Procurement B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Conduct a statewide procurement planning effort Conduct a statewide procurement planning effort for FY25-FY27 that convenes a TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
and value for FY25-FY27 cross-departmental team of procurement leaders, identifies commonly purchased unfamiliar immediately)
commodities and services, calculates prior year aggregate demand, adjusts demand
for externalities, develops a coordinated purchasing plan, and appoints designees to
lead specific purchases
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-31 B. Procurement B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Select vendor and design a user- and supplier- Combine all procurement functionality into a single, consolidated software system TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
and value friendly e-procurement solution that integrates to that automates both simple and complex procurement actions and tracks process and
core SAP (AASIS) data spend compliance to continually optimize processes and policies for efficiency and
effectiveness. Example functionality includes project management for RFP planning,
reaching a broad vendor base, executing sealed bids, conducting response
assessments and award analytics, setting up contracts, issuing payment against
contracts, flagging contracts up for renewal, hosting product catalogs for smaller
purchases, tracking spend categories over time, etc.
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-32 B. Procurement B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Establish spend monitoring capabilities and Establish spend monitoring capabilities and program to minimize off-contract TSS Enterprise 0. 0 5. 50%+ (~10,000+) 4. Unfamiliar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Wave 1 and value program purchasing and identify other value opportunities Enterprise-wide immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-33 B. Procurement B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Redesign procurement personnel pathways Redesign procurement personnel pathways to incentivize capability building and TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 4. Unfamiliar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
Wave 1 and value performance-based professional advancement Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-34 B. Procurement B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Launch a robust certification for procurement Create various "procurement excellence pathways" for procurement personnel to TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
and value professionals across roles, departments, and tenure build their capabilities and better execute their job responsibilities in a strategic way unfamiliar immediately)
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-36 B. Procurement B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Redesign RFP process mapping to appropriately Redesign RFP process maps to standardize engagement of subject matter experts, TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
and value engage SMEs and execute the solicitation process department stakeholders, and OSP participation in the process immediately)
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-37 C. Asset optimization & C. Asset optimization & capital expenditures Fleet maintenance & fuel: Negotiate a statewide Fleet maintenance & fuel: Negotiate a statewide maintenance contract and utilize TSS Enterprise 0. 0 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
capital expenditures maintenance contract and utilize OEM-dealer OEM-dealer relationships to increase vehicle availability
Wave 1 relationships Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-38 C. Asset optimization & C. Asset optimization & capital expenditures Fleet maintenance & fuel: Build bulk refueling Invest in a bulk refueling station for vehicles domiciled in Little Rock and North Little TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Wave 1 capital expenditures station in Little Rock Rock to refuel at cheaper rates than retail fuel locations Enterprise-wide immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-39 C. Asset optimization & C1 Optimize fleet management Fleet right sizing: Maximize vehicle trade in value Maximize vehicle trade in value by: TSS Enterprise 0. 0 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
capital expenditures - Tracking key used car market indices (e.g., US Bureau of Labor Statics used
vehicle price index, NADA used vehicle volume supply) to better understand periods
to sell vs hold surplus vehicles and increase vehicle trade in value
- Adopting pre-auction best-practices (e.g., detail vehicles, remove decals, clear
engine codes from dashboard, perform cosmetic touch ups)
- Partnering with an auctioneer that is incentivited to maximize resale value of
vehicle (e.g. received percentage of sales price)
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
High priority FUNC-4 B. Procurement B1 Manage demand for vendors and support Standardize specifications for long tail purchases Standardize specifications for long tail purchases by determining most commonly TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
and award state contracts for those purchases purchased products, rationalizing where certain products are exorbitant except in unfamiliar immediately)
special cases, creating product specification policies, and conducting IFBs for
statewide contracts on products with those specifications
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
Medium priority FUNC-40 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Consolidate Little Rock: Develop Based on aggregated data, establish portfolio priorities to identify specific TSS Enterprise 0. 0 0. 0% 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
capital expenditures Little Rock metro area real estate plan opportunities to consolidate into ~2.0M SF of office by 2030, including: unfamiliar immediately)
1) Consolidation of central state offices/employees to downtown Little Rock to help
revitalization efforts and save costs
2) Prioritization of filling state-owned buildings with state departments/entities
Plan priorities could be enabled by:
1) Policy changes for office space entitlements for new projects (e.g., space
allocation standards of 200-225 SF/FTE, limitations on positions that are assigned
private office space)
2) Adjustment of property purchase and lease processes to empower DBA (e.g.,
ability to veto locations, reject requests for assigned private office space)
3) Creation of a pool of underutilized department-owned and leased properties that
can be used as a "first stop shopping list" for departmental real estate leaders
seeking additional space
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
High priority FUNC-41 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Consolidate Little Rock office space in line with Reduce office footprint and real estate cost in Little Rock by: TSS Enterprise 1. <10k citizens 4. 25-50% (~10,000) 3. Somewhat 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
capital expenditures metro area plan 1) Moving departments from leased space into existing owned space; consolidating unfamiliar
departments into one location if possible
2) Exiting all (or nearly all) private leases
3) Selling underutilized buildings after consolidation
4) Subleasing remaining space no longer needed where space cannot be sold or
lease cannot be terminated
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-42 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Consolidate Little Rock: Collocate all Add workstations, convert private office spaces, redesign collaborative spaces and TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
capital expenditures of ADPHT to 1100 North/CMF complex adopt flexible work policies to enable ADPHT employees at 1 Capitol Mall to relocate
Wave 1 to Heritage Building (1100 North) Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-43 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Consolidate Little Rock: Move portion Move ADE employees currently housed by DHS (Donaghey Plaza) to 2 Capitol Mall TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
capital expenditures of ADE from DHS Building to 2 Capitol Mall (as to avoid new temporary lease with above-market rent/high buildout costs at Victory
potential first phase of ADE collocation) Building
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-44 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Consolidate Little Rock: Move portion Relocate ADE special education and federal programs employees at Victory Building TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
capital expenditures of ADE from Victory Building to 2 Capitol Mall (1401 W Capitol Avenue) to 2 Capitol Mall to exit lease with above-market rent
(second phase of ADE collocation)
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-45 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Consolidate Little Rock: Pilot Create more efficient workstation space and more shared collaborative spaces in TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
capital expenditures alternative workspace design as part of ADWS Commerce Building to serve as lighthouse example of new real estate approaches unfamiliar
Wave 1 move to Commerce Building Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-46 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Consolidate Little Rock: Make Make underutilized spaces easily reservable/usable for all departments via TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
capital expenditures underutilized meeting spaces in Little Rock centralized process as pilot/visible example of space-sharing by:
available for broader use 1) Centralizing booking process/system for large conference spaces across agencies
with presence in Little Rock
2) Communicate from secretaries the support for sharing conference and meeting
space via new mechanism
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-47 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Consolidate Little Rock: Implement Temporarily pause purchase/lease of new office space until completion of Little Rock TSS Enterprise 0. 0 0. 0% 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
capital expenditures "no net new sites" policy master plan, and require consultation of DBA for all future inquiries about additional
Wave 1 space to ensure alignment with plan Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-48 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Optimize Statewide Network: Aggregate and analyze detailed real estate portfolio data (e.g., seats, occupancy, TSS Enterprise 0. 0 0. 0% 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
capital expenditures Evaluate space consolidation opportunities outside utilization) for citizen service centers outside of Little Rock to identify specific unfamiliar immediately)
of Little Rock opportunities to collocate and/or reduce footprint for provision of particular services.
Analysis may center on:
1) Potential collocation of citizen service sites by city/county
2) Potential digitally-enabled delivery of services at select citizen service sites (e.g.,
online, kiosks)
3) Potential "template" service center redesign in more consistent, space-efficient
format for common use types (e.g., DHS - County Operations, DFA-OCSE)
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
High priority FUNC-49 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Consolidate statewide office space outside of Little Reduce office footprint and real estate cost outside of Little Rock by: TSS Enterprise 3. 100k-500k citizens 3. 15-25% (~5,000) 3. Somewhat 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
capital expenditures Rock 1) Moving departments from leased space into existing owned space; consolidating unfamiliar
departments into one location if possible
2) Exiting all (or nearly all) private leases
3) Selling underutilized buildings after consolidation
4) Subleasing remaining space no longer needed where space cannot be sold or
lease cannot be terminated
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-5 B. Procurement B1 Manage demand for vendors and support Standardize specifications for fleet and award state Standardize specifications for fleet by determining most commonly purchased Enterprise 0. 0 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
contracts for those purchases technology products, rationalizing where certain products are exorbitant except in unfamiliar immediately)
special cases, creating product specification policies, and conducting IFBs for
statewide contracts on products with those specifications Finance &
Wave 1 Administration Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-50 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Optimize Statewide Network: Triage Evaluate leases expiring in the next 6-9 months housing 1-3 employees to see if they TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
capital expenditures and relocate small sites with expiring leases can be accommodated in nearby space immediately)
Wave 1 outside of Little Rock Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-51 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Optimize Statewide Network: Create Compile list of distributed sites across state with space for at least 1-2 employees to TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
capital expenditures hoteling and meeting room availability list for work temporarily as necessary (e.g., during field work) and underutilized meeting immediately)
Wave 1 distributed sites across the state spaces that could be shared more broadly Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-52 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Optimize Statewide Network: Verify legal requirements for paper file retention (e.g., for OCSE records), right-size TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
capital expenditures Establish clear guidelines for paper file reduction to file storage capacity to align with requirements, and repurpose excess space for unfamiliar immediately)
limit storage space needs employee use where possible. Also evaluate existing leased storage space usage
Wave 1 and reduce/consolidate where feasible. Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-53 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Improve Land Use: Evaluate land use Based on aggregated data, identify underutilized land parcels owned by the State and TSS Enterprise 0. 0 0. 0% 4. Unfamiliar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
capital expenditures and sell or repurpose underutilized land sell/repurpose those parcels. Categorization could split lands based on location and
existing structures:
1) Land in or near central Little Rock without improvements (e.g., buildings)
2) Land in or near central Little Rock with improvements
3) Outside Little Rock without improvements
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-54 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Maintenance: Centralize and optimize Improve maintenance on owned facilities by: TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
capital expenditures maintenance for owned properties (e.g., 1) Contracting for preventative maintenance services for major building systems unfamiliar immediately)
preventative maintenance, outsourcing) (e.g., HVAC)
2) Renegotiating existing facilities management/maintenance contracts for owned
properties to consolidate contracts, have scale, etc.
3) Establish a partnership with an Integrated Facilities Management partner (e.g.,
JLL, CBRE) to perform all FM services for owned properties; this could include
potential transfer of State FM employees to the partner firm
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
Medium priority FUNC-55 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Maintenance: Revaluate full-service DBA evaluates and restructures leases to avoid poor maintenance and maintenance TSS Enterprise 0. 0 0. 0% 4. Unfamiliar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
capital expenditures leases vs. insourced/outsourced maintenance passthrough costs on full-service leases. This could include:
across portfolio 1) Systematic tracking of maintenance requirements for leased buildings
2) Investing in management of facilities management/maintenance
3) Build out of service provision capability or identification of appropriate partners
4) Renegotiation of leases to triple-ne4
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-56 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Maintenance: Increase energy Invest in facility improvements that will reduce energy consumption/expenses (e.g., TSS Enterprise 0. 0 0. 0% 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
capital expenditures efficiency of facilities LED/motion activated lighting, HVAC enhancements, equipment modernization, immediately)
insulation, and solar installation) while initiating monthly monitoring and continuous
communications campaigns to reduce electricity and natural gas use
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-57 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Enabler: Clearly communicate DBA Publish process maps for real estate leasing and purchase processes and share with TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
capital expenditures capabilities and responsibilities in property leasing departmental real estate leaders to clarify key points of contact and facilitate
and purchasing processes engagement between departments and DBA on departmental real estate needs
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-58 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Enabler: Evaluate and upgrade Assess and select real estate specific tools for portfolio management (e.g., Archibus, TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
capital expenditures workplace management systems to integrate lease, Planon) that support greater integration of data into real estate planning and portfolio unfamiliar immediately)
space, and occupant data management processes (e.g., space design, utilization tracking, maintenance)
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-59 C. Asset optimization & C2 Capture and maximize value from real estate Real Estate - Enabler: Reimagine the structure, Evaluate existing organizational structure and capacity against anticipated TSS Enterprise 0. 0 0. 0% 4. Unfamiliar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
capital expenditures mandate, and size of the DBA organization to responsibilities and make adjustments (e.g., change reporting lines, add personnel) to immediately)
maximize value for the state and improve occupant meet future remit
Wave 1 experience Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-6 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Optimize 10 large contracts up for bid Optimize 10 large contracts up for bid by developing and executing a standard TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Wave 1 management negotiation process Enterprise-wide unfamiliar immediately)
High priority FUNC-60 D. Operational excellence D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Collaborate across statewide operational Improve coordination among operational excellence & citizen experience roles across TSS Enterprise 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
through digitization excellence & citizen experience roles the state and assess opportunities for centralized reporting structures in order to unfamiliar immediately)
create accountability across departments and disseminate best practices for
Wave 1 increased efficiency Enterprise-wide
Create minimum viable tool (e.g. Excel spreadsheet) to realign trips to lowest-cost
C. Asset optimization & Track and maximize fleet usage across mode of transport (e.g., mileage reimbursement vs pool vehicle) to minimize waste Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
High priority Wave 1 FUNC-608 capital expenditures C1 Optimize fleet management departments and increase transparency Administration Enterprise Enterprise-wide 0. 0 0. 0% 1. Familiar immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-61 D. Operational excellence D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Designate a call center management lead for the Appoint a call center management lead for the state who will: TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
through digitization state i.Oversee new hire training programs to ensure thorough onboarding and alignment
with call center objectives
ii.Implement ongoing skill development initiatives for call center staff to improve
performance
iii.Establish and maintain performance metrics to monitor call center efficiency and
effectiveness
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Document most common call types and reasons through data analysis and CSR
observation (manual or automated). Evaluate most effective/efficient resolution for
Diagnose and create an action plan to more each (e.g., streamline web applications, clarify notices, improve website UX, integrate
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including efficiently address primary call reasons for top chatbots, enhance IVR, adjust processes, and improve training program for staff). Finance &
Lower priority Wave 1 FUNC-62 D. Operational excellence through digitization internal call centers (e.g., DWS, DF&A, DHS) Develop action plan. Administration Enterprise Enterprise-wide 0. 0 0. 0% 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Based on prioritized content from "most common call type action plan", revamp
department websites with a user-centric design to enhance navigation and self-
service, ensuring accessibility and simplicity for residents:
Revamp department websites with a user-centric i. Assess current state websites for improvement opportunities, such as navigation
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including design to enhance navigation and self-service, and self-service features e.g., clarifying FAQ questions, improved page navigation. Finance & 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 FUNC-63 D. Operational excellence through digitization ensuring accessibility and simplicity for residents ii. Apply user-centric design principles to enhance website interface and functionality Administration Enterprise Enterprise-wide 5. 1M+ citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Based on prioritized content from "most common call type action plan", enhance
citizen access to information and assistance by integrating a chatbot system
proficient in autonomously resolving user inquiries
i. Identify the typical questions and topics where a chatbot system could be beneficial
ii. Develop specifications for a chatbot based on best practices in public and private
sector, and determine build-vs-buy decision.
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Develop the specifications for an expanded IVR iii. Integrate the chatbot system into the infrastructure of department websites, and Finance & 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 FUNC-64 D. Operational excellence through digitization system continuously iterate on the system by updating its knowledge base Administration Enterprise Enterprise-wide 5. 1M+ citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Deploy an IVR system that guides users through a series of options to resolve their
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Implement an enhanced IVR system to facilitate inquiries independently, reducing wait times and increasing efficiency of call center Finance & 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 FUNC-65 D. Operational excellence through digitization seamless self-service in citizen phone interactions operations Administration Enterprise Enterprise-wide 4. 500k-1M citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Develop a comprehensive skills enhancement program tailored to the specific needs
D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Develop the specifications for an expanded IVR and roles of call center agents and in-person employees (e.g., providing ongoing Finance & 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 FUNC-66 D. Operational excellence tools system for call center employees training, access to job aids, and performance management tools, etc.) Administration Enterprise Enterprise-wide 4. 500k-1M citizens 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Utilize predictive analytics to forecast service demand and dynamically adjust staffing
D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Utilize predictive analytics for optimal service levels and schedules to maintain optimal service delivery without overburdening Finance & 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 FUNC-67 D. Operational excellence tools delivery resources Administration Enterprise Enterprise-wide 4. 500k-1M citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-68 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff Statewide Automation Initiative: Identify priority use For each department, identify top ~2-3 role-specific use cases for automation (i.e., TSS Enterprise 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
cases for the statewide automation initiative identify areas with high number of employees with a high percentage of time on a unfamiliar immediately)
readily automatable task). Build a business case for 3-5 priority use cases across the
Wave 1 enterprise Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-69 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff Statewide Automation Initiative: Implement priority Refine business case and make build-vs-buy decision on prioritized automation use TSS Enterprise 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
use cases for the statewide automation initiative cases. Pilot and launch implementation of top ~2-3 role-specific use cases for unfamiliar
automation and implement value capture / tracking to measure outcomes and ROI of
Wave 1 the use case. Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-7 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Optimize fleet contract Optimize fleet contract by renegotiating statewide vehicle contracts to utilize OEM- Finance & Enterprise 0. 0 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Wave 1 management dealer relationships for rate & availability Administration Enterprise-wide unfamiliar immediately)
Low priority FUNC-72 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Modernize legacy application portfolio to reduce Coordinate and lead modernization efforts across departments for applications that TSS Enterprise 0. 0 4. 25-50% (~10,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
management and modernization tech debt are hosted on end-of-life hardware / software. Could be accomplished in a phased
approach:
i. Assessment in each department to identify which current applications are hosted on
end-of-life servers
ii. Modernization planning and timelining for each application
iii. Modernization program tracking as it is executed by CIOs
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
High priority FUNC-73 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Standardize and improve large IT program Standardize and improve large IT program governance and management to minimize TSS Enterprise 0. 0 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
management and modernization governance and management project schedule and cost over-runs by introducing a governance oversight model, unfamiliar immediately)
that includes independent validation of project progress and project budget tracking.
This model is split into two tiers:
i. portfolio governance which monitors status, health, and prioritization of projects at a
Statewide level
ii.individual project governance for the largest ~18 identified projects
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-74 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Consolidate department servers into DIS Gradually centralize all physical and virtualized servers maintained independently by TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
management and modernization datacenter different cabinet departments within DIS' greenfield datacenter and / or cloud immediately)
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Low priority FUNC-75 E. Core tech modernization E3 Negotiate better pricing for large IT Conduct "quick wins" analysis to identify and For upcoming large IT contracts renewing or being awarded in next ~6 months (mid- TSS Enterprise 0. 0 0. 0% 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
procurements capture value in upcoming procurements FY25), conduct quick-win analysis (e.g., benchmarking proposed rates against unfamiliar immediately)
industry or other AR rates, review and optimize labor pyramid, cleansheet) to identify
potential opportunities for rate optimization
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-76 E. Core tech modernization E3 Negotiate better pricing for large IT Build large IT project vendor management & Create capabilities within DIS to support OSP and department CIOs on negotiations TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
procurements procurement capabilities within DIS related specifically to large IT contracts and procurement processes. Capabilities to unfamiliar immediately)
build include:
i. Supplier management, e.g., aligning and benchmarking labor rates, optimizing
workforce mix, consolidating vendors etc.
ii. Demand management e.g., Optimizing SLAs / specs, more stringent change
management, etc.
iii. Governance e.g., creating greater spend transparency and chargeback processes
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-77 E. Core tech modernization E4 Build new capabilities including cybersecurity Implement cybersecurity quick wins Improve short-term cybersecurity risk by: TSS Enterprise 0. 0 0. 0% 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
and analytics i. Creating a Statewide set of standards for cybersecurity unfamiliar immediately)
ii. Implementing a set of immediate cybersecurity initiatives e.g., endpoint protection
Wave 1 installed, removing end-of-life software, deployment of MFA, etc. Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-78 E. Core tech modernization E4 Build new capabilities including cybersecurity Standardize and improve cybersecurity Statewide Improve longer-term cybersecurity risk posture for the state by addressing standards TSS Enterprise 0. 0 0. 0% 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
and analytics and capabilities needs from departments: unfamiliar immediately)
i. Build TSS capabilities / resources to offer support / guidance in implementation to
other departments in meeting the cybersecurity standard
ii. Asess and improve risk posture across major cybersecurity categories e.g.,
architecture & engineering (zero trust), data privacy & security, etc.
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-79 E. Core tech modernization E4 Build new capabilities including cybersecurity Identify and prioritize the top 2-3 analytics use Statewide, create and prioritize a list of use cases for data & analytics and identify top TSS Enterprise 1. <10k citizens 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
and analytics cases across the enterprise and launch those use ~2-3 in each department unfamiliar immediately)
cases For top ~2-3+ prioritized use cases, conduct current state assessment, and launch a
pilot with respective departments designed to test ROI and feasibility of the project
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-8 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Optimize janitorial services contracts by Optimize janitorial services contracts by consolidating contracts across the state and TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
management consolidating contracts across the state and renegotiating rates
Wave 1 renegotiating rates Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-80 D. Operational excellence D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Establish statewide marketing and brand standards Establish statewide marketing and brand standards to promote a more cohesive TSS Enterprise 5. 1M+ citizens 5. 50%+ (~10,000+) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Wave 1 through digitization citizen experience Enterprise-wide immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-81 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Standardize position titles and definitions Standardize and simplify position titles and definitions to enable better visibility into TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
Wave 1 clarity personnel trends across departments Enterprise-wide immediately)
High priority FUNC-82 A. Personnel A1 Adjust pay plan and total rewards Reduce reliance on outside contractors Adjust pay and benefits to move relevant positions from third party contractors to in- TSS Enterprise 0. 0 0. 0% 2. Somewhat familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
Wave 1 house in order to build talent and lower net costs Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-83 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Streamline hiring processes Streamline hiring processes to prioritize quick action during key hiring period and TSS Enterprise 0. 0 3. 15-25% (~5,000) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Wave 1 system reduce vacancy hours Enterprise-wide immediately)
Medium priority FUNC-85 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Optimize general and managerial training offerings Optimize general and managerial training offerings to ensure they are appropriately TSS Enterprise 0. 0 4. 25-50% (~10,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
system sophisticated and fit-for-purpose in order to build in-house talent, promote career immediately)
development, increase employee retention, and decrease turnover costs
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-87 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Monitor and plan for upcoming talent shifts Monitor and plan for upcoming talent shifts by determining which positions could be TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
system experiencing a drop off in either skills required to deliver services or other trends in immediately)
Wave 1 order to reduce turnover and vacancy costs Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-88 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Create unified orientation process Create unified orientation structure with standard elements run by central group (e.g., TSS Enterprise 0. 0 4. 25-50% (~10,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
system OPM) and department/division-specific elements run in coordination immediately)
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-9 B. Procurement B2 Refine pricing through analytical category Optimize actuarial services contracts Optimize actuarial services contracts by consolidating contracts across the state and TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Wave 1 management renegotiating rates Enterprise-wide
Medium priority FUNC-90 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Deploy a central IT applications catalog Deploy a central IT applications catalog to reduce overall subscription costs TSS Enterprise 0. 0 5. 50%+ (~10,000+) 2. Somewhat familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
Wave 1 management and modernization Enterprise-wide immediately)
High priority TSS-0 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Optimize TSS manager roles and team size for As the overarching leader for the Agile Organization initiative, oversee TSS Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
clarity better control and efficiency implementation of a tailored and modernized organization (including managing immediately)
initiative sub-charters) to ensure effective distribution of management responsibilities,
enhanced operational efficiency, and improved role clarity among managerial
Wave 1 positions Prioritized
High priority TSS-10 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Consolidate executive branch boards and Consolidate executive branch boards and commissions to streamline decision TSS Accountable Department 1. <10k citizens 3. 15-25% (~5,000) 3. Somewhat 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
Wave 1 clarity commissions governance and increase operational efficiency Prioritized unfamiliar immediately)
High priority TSS-11 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Improve coordination among procurement roles Improve coordination among procurement roles across the state and assess TSS Multi-Department (listed in 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
clarity across the state opportunities for centralized reporting structures in order to create accountability Initiative Description) unfamiliar immediately)
across departments, standardize common procurement activities, pool demand, and
Wave 1 achieve lower total cost of ownership Prioritized
High priority TSS-12 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Improve coordination among HR roles across the Improve coordination among HR roles across the state and assess opportunities for TSS Multi-Department (listed in 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
clarity state centralized reporting structures in order to create accountability across departments, Initiative Description) unfamiliar immediately)
standardize common HR activities, make employee experience more consistent
across the state, and disseminate best practices for increased efficiency
Wave 1 Prioritized
High priority TSS-13 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Improve coordination among IT roles across the Improve coordination among IT roles across the state and assess opportunities for TSS Multi-Department (listed in 1. <10k citizens 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
clarity state centralized reporting structures in order to create accountability across departments, Initiative Description) unfamiliar immediately)
standardize common IT activities, consolidate IT systems & licenses, and create
more consistency in cybersecurity & data governance practices
Wave 1 Prioritized
Low priority TSS-2 F. Agile organization F3 Optimize shared service delivery Expand GIS service offerings Expand GIS service offerings to underutilizing or non-utilizing departments to support TSS Accountable Department 1. <10k citizens 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Wave 1 efficient and effective decision-making Not prioritized immediately)
Medium priority TSS-26 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Provide additional procurement training for Provide additional training and FAQs on procurement processes for all relevant TSS Enterprise 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Wave 1 system departments department-level personnel Enterprise-wide immediately)
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
Based on prioritized content from "most common call type action plan", revamp
department websites with a user-centric design to enhance navigation and self-
service, ensuring accessibility and simplicity for residents:
i. Assess current state websites for improvement opportunities, such as navigation
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Revamp department websites with user-centric and self-service features e.g., clarifying FAQ questions, improved pag navigation,etc. Multi-Department (listed in 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 TSS-28 D. Operational excellence through digitization design for enhanced navigation and self-service ii. Apply user-centric design principles to enhance website interface and functionality TSS Initiative Description) Not prioritized 5. 1M+ citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Medium priority TSS-28 E. Core tech modernization E1 Reduce volume of work in application and Evaluate relationship with INA Evaluate relationship with INA by benchmarking against other states and other similar TSS Accountable Department 5. 1M+ citizens 4. 25-50% (~10,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
Wave 1 project pipeline vendors' offerings Not prioritized immediately)
Based on prioritized content from "most common call type action plan", enhance
citizen access to information and assistance by integrating a chatbot system
proficient in autonomously resolving user inquiries
i. Identify the typical questions and topics where a chatbot system could be beneficial
ii. Develop specifications for a chatbot based on best practices in public and private
sector, and determine build-vs-buy decision.
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Enhance citizen access to information and iii. Integrate the chatbot system into the infrastructure of department websites, and Multi-Department (listed in 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 TSS-29 D. Operational excellence through digitization assistance through integration of a chatbot system continuously iterate on the system by updating its knowledge base TSS Initiative Description) Not prioritized 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) unfamiliar immediately)
High priority TSS-30 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Create an IT procurement center of excellence Create an IT procurement center of excellence within DIS to streamline procurement TSS Enterprise 2. 10k-100k citizens 5. 50%+ (~10,000+) 1. Familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
management and modernization of IT projects and rate negotiation while optimizing vendor management practices immediately)
Wave 1 Enterprise-wide
Based on prioritized content from "most common call type action plan", develop the
specifications for an expanded IVR system, enabling AR citizens to autonomously
D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Develop the specifications for an expanded IVR resolve common questions, and make build-vs-buy decision. Execute on the plan and Multi-Department (listed in 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 TSS-30 D. Operational excellence through digitization system stand up the tool, tracking proficiency of resolving issues and iterating to improve. TSS Initiative Description) Not prioritized 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
Develop a comprehensive skills enhancement program tailored to the specific needs
D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Develop a comprehensive skills enhancement and roles of call center agents and in-person employees (e.g., providing ongoing Multi-Department (listed in 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 TSS-31 D. Operational excellence tools program for call center employees training, access to job aids, and performance management tools, etc.) TSS Initiative Description) Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) unfamiliar immediately)
Medium priority TSS-31 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Create a cybersecurity center of excellence Create a cybersecurity center of excellence within DIS to refine & manage TSS Enterprise 0. 0 5. 50%+ (~10,000+) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
management and modernization cybersecurity standards and offer guidance to other departments in their utilization of immediately)
Wave 1 cybersecurity tools & standards Enterprise-wide
Utilize predictive analytics to forecast service demand and dynamically adjust staffing
D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Utilize predictive analytics for optimal service levels and schedules to maintain optimal service delivery without overburdening Multi-Department (listed in 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Lower priority Wave 1 TSS-32 D. Operational excellence tools delivery resources TSS Initiative Description) Not prioritized 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) unfamiliar immediately)
High priority TSS-36 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Establish a statewide data hub Establish a statewide data hub that will enable integrated service delivery to increase TSS Enterprise 5. 1M+ citizens 5. 50%+ (~10,000+) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
management and modernization the efficiency and comprehensiveness of government services, enhance the immediately)
cohesiveness of citizen experience, and make use of leading technologies that
Wave 1 improve business process efficiency and lower costs Enterprise-wide
Low priority TSS-37 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Improve coordination among Benefits roles across Improve coordination among benefits roles across the state and assess opportunities TSS Multi-Department (listed in 1. <10k citizens 5. 50%+ (~10,000+) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
clarity the state for centralized reporting structures in order to create accountability across Initiative Description) unfamiliar immediately)
departments, standardize common benefits activities, make employee experience
more consistent across the state, and disseminate best practices for increased
Wave 1 efficiency Not prioritized
Medium priority TSS-38 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Deploy LAUNCH program Deploy the LAUNCH program, leveraging the statewide data hub to quickly connect TSS Accountable Department 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
management and modernization job-seekers to state employers and lower vacancy and hiring costs immediately)
Wave 1 Not prioritized
High priority TSS-39 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Deploy Arkansan- and employee-facing platforms Deploy Arkansan- and employee-facing platforms that leverage the statewide data TSS Accountable Department 5. 1M+ citizens 5. 50%+ (~10,000+) 1. Familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
management and modernization to leverage statewide data hub hub to increase the efficiency and comprehensiveness of government services, immediately)
enhance the cohesiveness of Arkansan experience, and make use of leading
technologies that improve business process efficiency and lower cost
Wave 1 Prioritized
Medium priority TSS-40 E. Core tech modernization E1 Reduce volume of work in application and Coordinate assessment and de-prioritization of non- Coordinate assessment and de-prioritization of non-critical or non-urgent current and TSS Accountable Department 0. 0 0. 0% 2. Somewhat familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
project pipeline critical or non-urgent current and upcoming projects upcoming projects in all departments. Projects could be classified based on a set of
in all departments targeted questions that can include but are not limited to: business criticality,
urgency, and federal / legislative mandate
Projects could be classified based on a set of targeted questions that can include but
are not limited to: business criticality, urgency, and federal / legislative mandate
Priority departments include DHS, DFA, ADE, DPS, ACOM.
Wave 1 Not prioritized
High priority TSS-6 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Launch centralized FOIA processing division Launch centralized FOIA request processing division to field, triage, and fulfill FOIA TSS Accountable Department 5. 1M+ citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Wave 1 clarity requests and reduce administrative burden on state employees Prioritized unfamiliar immediately)
Medium priority TSS-7 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Create shared services training for departments Create coordinated, structured training for how departments can engage effectively TSS Accountable Department 0. 0 5. 50%+ (~10,000+) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Wave 1 clarity with statewide shared services in order to eliminate pain points Not prioritized immediately)
High priority TSS-9 F. Agile organization F3 Optimize shared service delivery Develop shared services performance framework For all shared services, develop a performance framework that defines the customer TSS Accountable Department 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
base, establishes success metrics, and tracks & mitigates underperformance to those immediately)
Wave 1 metrics Prioritized
Medium Wave 2 ADVA-9 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Explore partnerships to hire more veterans Explore partnerships between ADVA and veteran advocate organizations (e.g., non- Veterans Affairs Accountable Department
system profits for transitioning veterans) to employ more Arkansas-based veterans 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) unfamiliar immediately)
High priority Wave 2 19 E. Core tech modernization E1 Reduce volume of work in application and Coordinate identification and retirement of non- Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business critical or duplicative Parks, Heritage, and Organization-wide
project pipeline business critical/duplicative applications across all applications across all departments. Could be accomplished in a phased approach: Tourism
divisions of PHT 1) Initial assessment to gather application data and walk through assessment criteria
(e.g., business criticality)
2) Identify and finalize candidate applications
3) Sunset plan and timeline for each application
4) Track value capture with TSS (e.g., reduction or reinvestment of contract hours)
2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Enterprise-wide 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
High priority Wave 2 E&E - 99 E. Core tech modernization E1 Reduce volume of work in application and Coordinate identification and retirement of non- Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business critical or duplicative Energy & Organization-wide
project pipeline business critical/duplicative applications across all applications across all departments. Could be accomplished in a phased approach: Environment
divisions E&E 1) Initial assessment to gather application data and walk through assessment criteria
(e.g., business criticality)
2) Identify and finalize candidate applications
3) Sunset plan and timeline for each application
4) Track value capture with TSS (e.g., reduction or reinvestment of contract hours)
2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Enterprise-wide 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
High priority Wave 2 ADH - 99 E. Core tech modernization E1 Reduce volume of work in application and Coordinate identification and retirement of non- Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business critical or duplicative Health Organization-wide
project pipeline business critical/duplicative applications across all applications across all departments. Could be accomplished in a phased approach:
divisions of ADH 1) Initial assessment to gather application data and walk through assessment criteria
(e.g., business criticality)
2) Identify and finalize candidate applications
3) Sunset plan and timeline for each application
4) Track value capture with TSS (e.g., reduction or reinvestment of contract hours)
2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Enterprise-wide 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
High priority Wave 2 ADLL - 99 E. Core tech modernization E1 Reduce volume of work in application and Coordinate identification and retirement of non- Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business critical or duplicative Labor & Licensing Organization-wide
project pipeline business critical/duplicative applications across all applications across all departments. Could be accomplished in a phased approach:
divisions of ADLL 1) Initial assessment to gather application data and walk through assessment criteria
(e.g., business criticality)
2) Identify and finalize candidate applications
3) Sunset plan and timeline for each application
4) Track value capture with TSS (e.g., reduction or reinvestment of contract hours)
2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Enterprise-wide 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
High priority Wave 2 ADVA - 99 E. Core tech modernization E1 Reduce volume of work in application and Coordinate identification and retirement of non- Coordinate identification and retirement of non-business critical or duplicative Veterans Affairs Organization-wide
project pipeline business critical/duplicative applications across all applications across all departments. Could be accomplished in a phased approach:
divisions of ADVA 1) Initial assessment to gather application data and walk through assessment criteria
(e.g., business criticality)
2) Identify and finalize candidate applications
3) Sunset plan and timeline for each application
4) Track value capture with TSS (e.g., reduction or reinvestment of contract hours)
2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Enterprise-wide 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
High priority Wave 2 DOTM-3 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Accelerate and optimize document routing process Modernize the document routing process for all documents currently processed Military Accountable Department
management and modernization manually (e.g., federal reimbursement, delivery orders, invoices, contracts). Increase
the routing efficiency, accuracy, and speed by integrating advanced tracking and
automation features. Train users on new systems and reduce document processing 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
time and errors Prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) unfamiliar immediately)
Low Wave 2 DOTM-8 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Accelerate federal reimbursement through Identify and automate manual elements the federal reimbursement process. Deploy Military Accountable Department
management and modernization automation software to expedite the submission, processing, and payment stages, targeting a
reduction in cycle times and fewer processing errors 3. Somewhat
Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) unfamiliar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Medium Wave 2 ADLL-06 D. Operational excellence D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Accelerate rollout of Electronic Licensing and Accelerate rollout of the Electronic Licensing and Permitting (ELP) system in FY25 Labor & Licensing Accountable Department
through digitization Permitting (ELP) platform for the Boards of Accounting, Contractors, and Boilers to gain benefits of more
efficient process for permit applications, renewals, and transmission
Not prioritized 1. <10K citizens 0. 0% 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
Low Wave 2 E&E - 9 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Apply learnings across tech modernization efforts Capture and implement learnings where applicable from implementation of database Energy & Accountable Department
management and modernization and program management system to expedite adoption of SEEK pilot phase 3 in Environment 2. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
DEQ Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) familiar immediately)
Low Wave 2 ADLL-17 H. Department-specific lever G2. Grant opportunities Better pursue grants Improve processes for grant identification and application submission to ensure Labor & Licensing Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
department is considered for additional funding to help it carry out its mission unfamiliar immediately)
Not prioritized
High priority Wave 2 ADVA-6 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Broaden career paths for workers in veteran homes Establish partnerships with existing state programs and entities (e.g. UAMS, Veterans Affairs Accountable Department
system Arkansas Healthcare Association, DHS) to create cross-departmental professional
development opportunities for employees of veteran homes to improve employee
experience, more effectively recruit new talent, and retain more staff 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) unfamiliar immediately)
High priority Wave 2 ADVA-1 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Build a standardized onboarding and compliance Identify key areas of opportunity for improving onboarding and compliance practices, Veterans Affairs Accountable Department
clarity curriculum prioritize the most impactful areas and build curriculums to improve departmental 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
efficiency and organization Prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
High priority Wave 2 PHT - 7 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees Centralize grant data across all divisions and Create centralized repository of grants distributed from Tourism, Parks, and Heritage Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
standardize grant management practices to 1) better serve Arkansans by providing a 'single source of truth' (e.g., application Tourism immediately)
instructions, criteria for funding) for PHT grants and 2) reduce administrative burden
of tracking grant compliance (e.g., automated requests for supporting documents,
automated flag of out of compliance grantees) and 3) maximize ROI
Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 ADLL-05 F. Agile organization F2 Improve collaboration among agencies Centralize physical location of boards Relocate the three remaining agency boards (Board of Contractors, Board of Labor & Licensing Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
Engineers, and Board of Real Estate) that are not located in the main building to
enable more efficient coordination and management (This initiative does not capture
the associated real estate savings) Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 DPS-3 B. Procurement F2 Improve collaboration among agencies Collaborate with other state agencies to pool Identify leveraging opportunities for purchasing lab equipment, maintenance Public Safety Accountable Department
purchasing, maintenance, instrument calibration, services, instrument calibration, etc. with other agencies that operate labs
etc. (Agriculture, Health, etc.). TSS should be involved in the collaboration.
Prioritized
Medium Wave 2 ADLL-07 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Combine inspector labor pools Combine inspector roles and definitions for amusement ride and wage claim Labor & Licensing Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
clarity inspectors to allow more efficient use of department's inspector resources immediately)
Not prioritized
Medium Wave 2 ADH-13 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Conduct clean out of legacy licenses and software Conduct scan of active held program licenses and applications on servers and Health Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
management and modernization devices (e.g., legacy SPSS accounts) and identify licenses to keep or sunset to immediately)
reduce unnecessary spend Not prioritized
Low Wave 2 ADH-14 C. Asset optimization & C1 Optimize fleet management Conduct fleet replacement Conduct assessment on fleet replacement to review current fleet, understand Health Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
capital expenditures vehicles needs, and provide vehicles for replacement to provide staff safe, reliable immediately)
transport when providing services to citizens that require transport
Not prioritized
Low Wave 2 ADVA-4 G. Revenue opportunity G3. Other funding mechanisms Consider external partnerships to fund select ADVA Supplement existing funding sources with external/alternative sources of funding Veterans Affairs Accountable Department
initiatives (e.g., foundations, private companies, individual donations) to support programs 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) unfamiliar immediately)
High priority Wave 2 PHT - 4 G. Revenue opportunity G3. Other funding mechanisms Consider public private partnerships with Arkansan Enhance Arkansan experience through exploring PPP between PHT offerings (e.g., Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 5. 1M+ citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
businesses to improve guest experience Heritage and Parks locations) and Arkansas businesses (e.g., accommodation, Tourism unfamiliar immediately)
transportation, retail) Prioritized
Medium Wave 2 ADH-3 D. Operational excellence None Consolidate and standardize licensing system Increase online access to licensing system and streamline licensing processes (e.g., Health Accountable Department 2. 10K-100K citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
systems to provide licensure for cosmetologists, plumbers moved to online portal) to
improve customer experience and simplify vendor management
Not prioritized
Wave 2 ADLL-04 F. Agile organization F2 Improve collaboration among agencies Consolidate federal labor statistic reporting Consolidate federal labor statistic reporting positions by shifting 3 LMI reporting Labor & Licensing Multi-Department (listed in 0. 0 0. 0% 1. Familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
positions to central agency positions to ADLL from Commerce to facilitate single-source reporting Initiative Description) immediately)
High priority Prioritized
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
Low Wave 2 PHT - 17 F. Agile organization F2 Improve collaboration among agencies Consolidate financial data for increased leadership Adopt a comprehensive, live financial view across parks, heritage, and tourism to Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 3. 100K-500K 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
awareness enable leadership oversight of department finances (e.g., cumulative budget vs. Tourism citizens unfamiliar immediately)
actual) and increase transparency with Arkansans (e.g., communicate total dollars
distributed in grants) Not prioritized
Low Wave 2 ADLL-14 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Contemporize structure of HR databases Contemporize structure of HR databases by reducing the number of business areas Labor & Licensing Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
management and modernization in ACES and APRS. This reduction will reduce time spent pulling resource data for immediately)
BLR, EEOC, Employee Disclosure, and other information for monthly, quarterly, and
annual reporting. Requires gov, legislature, and OPM
Not prioritized
High priority Wave 2 DPS-4 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Contract for development of a singular electronic Law enforcement officers must login to multiple systems before ever leaving the Public Safety Accountable Department
management and modernization system that interfaces with all necessary law parking lot. Some systems must be logged out before the officers can use a different
enforcement systems (CAD, E-Crash, E-Site, etc.). system. This initiative will create a more efficient interfaced system that will increase
The system should include voice activation and be officer safety and improve performance.
mobile-friendly and should not require logging out
of one system in order to login to another.
Prioritized
Low Wave 2 ADH-17 E. Core tech modernization E1 Reduce volume of work in application and Coordinate assessment and de-prioritization of non- Coordinate annual assessment and de-prioritization of non-critical or non-urgent Health Accountable Department 0. 0 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
project pipeline critical or non-urgent current and upcoming current and upcoming initiatives across ADH divisions to drive progress on most immediately)
department initiatives critical initiatives. Initiatives could be classified based on a set of targeted questions
that can include but are not limited to: business criticality, level of progress, urgency,
and federal / legislative mandate Not prioritized
Medium Wave 2 E&E - 8 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff Create a proactive notification system for permits Develop and pilot a notification system that automatically alerts permit holders about Energy & Accountable Department 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
and compliance upcoming deadlines and relevant policy changes to decrease the percentage of Environment immediately)
permit lapses Not prioritized
Low Wave 2 ADH-10 F. Agile organization None Create opportunities for staff to internally share Establish newsletter, other internal publication, or "all hands" meetings to give staff Health Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
new research or technical announcements the opportunity to share their work to improve employee experience by encouraging immediately)
sense of recognition and accomplishment and facilitating peer learning
Not prioritized
Low Wave 2 ADLL-13 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Create pool for vacant positions for agency-wide Create pool for vacant positions to eliminate need to request OPM Pool positions Labor & Licensing Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
clarity use Not prioritized unfamiliar immediately)
High priority Wave 2 DPS-5 D. Operational excellence A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Develop and implement a leadership academy. Implement leadership training to address leadership skills at various levels for all Public Safety Accountable Department
system agency divisions. The curriculum’s focus will be on leadership skills that can be
applied to any manager in any division and will not be specific to procedures of any
one division.
Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 E&E - 7 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff Develop and institute more concise enforcement Create and implement streamlined templates for enforcement paperwork to reduce Energy & Accountable Department 3. 100k-500k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
templates the time spent writing notices Environment Prioritized immediately)
High priority Wave 2 DPS-2 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff Develop shared services standardized processes, Develop standardized processes to ensure the accuracy of deliverables. DPS will Public Safety Accountable Department
to include automated workflows, to increase develop automated workflows for consistency and timeliness of processes and
efficiency and effectiveness. deliverables. DPS will identify any processes where variance is necessary for
effective performance.
Prioritized
Medium Wave 2 ADH-16 D. Operational excellence D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Develop, encourage, and facilitate use of upskilling Expand programs tailored to increasing skills, create policies to encourage uptake Health Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
tools programs for employees (e.g., points system for trainings completed, opportunity to use work hours for immediately)
training), and create central repository of staff training resources to ensure
employees have the skills to be effective and feel they are developing (e.g.,
providing ongoing training, access to job aids, leadership training, and performance
management tools, etc.)
Not prioritized
Low Wave 2 DOTM-9 D. Operational excellence D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Empower DOTM employees with leading edge data Upskill DOTM employees with essential Microsoft Office 365 skills to enhance their Military Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
tools management skills productivity and efficiency. Provide hands-on training and follow-up resources to unfamiliar
utilize advanced functionalities. Focus areas could include data analysis and
visualization, and time-saving tips and tricks. Improve proficiency data management
capabilities Not prioritized
Low Wave 2 ADH-6 D. Operational excellence D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Enhance access to information through public Enhance external and internal access to high request and high impact data by Health Accountable Department 2. 10K-100K citizens 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
through digitization facing data, reports, and data query capabilities publishing data and reports and adding internal ability to query data to improve immediately)
transparency, reduce time requesters need to find information, and reduce time
providers need to spend pulling requests Not prioritized
Low Wave 2 ADLL-03 H. Department-specific lever None Enhance employer training curricula Enhance OSHA/MHSA training curricula to include child labor and wage-an-hour Labor & Licensing Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 0. 0% 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
content to better inform employers and serve employees Not prioritized
Low Wave 2 DOTM-7 F. Agile organization F2 Improve collaboration among agencies Enhance inter-departmental collaboration in mixed Develop team-building workshops to foster a shared mission and unity among mixed Military Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
federal/state divisions federal/state personnel. Identify cohorts via survey that have communication barriers unfamiliar
or issues. Establish clear, measurable goals (e.g., understanding other entity’s chain
of command) and hold sessions on monthly basis. Continue to monitor organizational
health via survey Not prioritized
High priority Wave 2 DPS-8 D. Operational excellence D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Enhance Operational Efficiency of the Abuse and Alignment of efforts to enhance prevention and meet individual and family needs Public Safety Accountable Department
through digitization Neglect Hotline upstream and ensuring efficient collaboration with DHS will improve safety and
enhance family well being Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 DOC-2 B. Procurement B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed and Enhance payment efficiency by streamlining online Enhance the efficiency of payments by streamlining the processes involved in both Corrections Accountable Department
value portal transactions and money order processes online portal transactions and money orders for restitution and commissary accounts.
This initiative aims to reduce processing times, minimize errors, and provide a more
seamless experience for all users. Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 PHT - 9 D. Operational excellence D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Ensure consistent financial administration practices Adopt consistent processes across accounting (e.g., AASIS), fixed assets, and Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
tools (e.g., accounting, fixed assets) across divisions procurement across divisions to reduce processing time and improve budget Tourism
management Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 PHT - 12 F. Agile organization F3 Optimize shared service delivery Ensure consistent HR practices (e.g., hiring, Adopt consistent processes across division human resources to ensure consistent Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 4. Unfamiliar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
onboarding) across divisions best practices (e.g., records, payroll, processing) and compliance to reduce over- Tourism
processing and inefficiency, and fix processes to drive more effective recruitment
strategies to enhance PHT’s competitive edge
Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 PHT - 15 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees Establish customer service training Codify and disseminate hospitality best practices for all guest-facing employees. Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 4. 500K-1M citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
Upskill experience focused roles (e.g., interpreters, museum educators) to improve Tourism immediately)
guest experience Prioritized
Low Wave 2 ADH-7 D. Operational excellence None Establish performance standards and KPIs for each Systematize a performance framework for each division and office (e.g., support Health Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
ADH division services such as finance and IT) that defines the internal and external customer immediately)
base, establishes success metrics for each, and create dashboards that tracks
metrics to improve customer experience Not prioritized
Medium Wave 2 PHT - 8 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees Establish quarterly budget reviews Adopt quarterly budget meetings with each PHT division's leadership to ensure Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
adherence to planned budget (e.g., evaluate select high spend areas and provide Tourism immediately)
feedback) and identify unexpected concentration of spend (e.g., over $20K spend on
one vendor) to ensure compliance across divisions
Not prioritized
Medium Wave 2 PHT - 16 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Establish recurring survey to collect improvement Establish recurring survey to collect potential improvement ideas (e.g., improving Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
system ideas to increase PHT efficiency and Arkansan operations, maintenance) from all layers of the organization and implement select Tourism
experience ideas to increase PHT efficiency Not prioritized
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
Low Wave 2 PHT - 18 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Expand college internship program Expand internship program that attracts and develops talent early through a college Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
system internship program to convert a portion of the intern pool into full time employees Tourism immediately)
providing a steady pipeline of talent Not prioritized
Low Wave 2 ADH-11 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Expand feedback system for staff to share Expand system for staff feedback (e.g., “stay interviews”) and response approach to Health Accountable Department 0. 0 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
system perspective and feedback on their experience at ensure staff feel heard and that their contributions are appreciated and impactful to immediately)
ADH improve retention Not prioritized
Low Wave 2 ADH-18 D. Operational excellence D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Expand telehealth offerings to additional services Expand telehealth offerings to additional services (e.g., XX) to increase access to Health Accountable Department 3. 100K-500K 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
through digitization services for citizens Not prioritized citizens immediately)
Medium Wave 2 PHT - 13 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff Explore and adopt project management tool that Adopt automated workflow system to streamline management of efforts (e.g., Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 3. 100K-500K 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 4. Unfamiliar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
meets requirements of multiple stakeholders (e.g., construction management, maintenance work orders) across PHT by saving time Tourism citizens immediately)
Maintenance, Planning & Development) (e.g., communications, project updates), resources (e.g., materials), and provide real-
time budget management (e.g., prevent budget overruns)
Not prioritized
Medium Wave 2 PHT - 11 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Explore software application compliance tools Explore software application compliance tools to 1) automatically flag when renewal Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
management and modernization is required and reduce accidental lapses in software licensing and 2) coordinate Tourism immediately)
identification and retirement of non-business critical or duplicative applications across
all divisions Not prioritized
Low Wave 2 ADH-15 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Focus on talent targeting and career development Improve ADH's ability to target and attract talent and to develop careers paths for Health Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
system employees to improve the employee experience and continually develop skills immediately)
needed to deliver the best service to Arkansans.
Not prioritized
Low Wave 2 DOTM-6 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Focus on talent targeting and career development Improve ability to target (e.g., correctly delineating position descriptions) and attract Military Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
system talent (e.g., new sources of talent) and to develop careers paths (e.g., work with unfamiliar immediately)
OPM1 to create opportunities for advancement and enhance skills development) to
improve the employee experience and continually develop skills needed to deliver
the best service to Arkansans Not prioritized
Medium Wave 2 E&E - 2 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Focus on talent targeting and career development Improve ability to target and attract talent and to develop careers paths for Energy & Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1.Familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
system employees to improve the employee experience and continually develop skills Environment immediately)
needed to deliver the best service to Arkansans.
> Target: skills demand forecasting, current skills assessments
> Attract: employee value proposition assessment, financial and non-financial
recruiting incentives, new sources of talent, more flexible hiring bonuses
> Develop career paths: Work with OPM to develop career paths within and across
departments to open up opportunities for advancement and enhance skills
development and sharing of best practices to improve overall experience and
effectiveness of AR state government
> Dependency: more flexible hiring bonuses may rely on changes to department
appropriation language; may need to work with DF&A to understand how to access
performance pay budget
Not prioritized
High priority Wave 2 DPS-6 D. Operational excellence A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Focus on talent targeting and career development. Improve DPS’ ability to target and attract employees. Develop career paths to Public Safety Accountable Department
system improve the employee experience and continually develop skills. Reduce reliance on
contractors. Create specific enhancements for specialized positions like Crime Lab
scientists and IT personnel.
Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 E&E - 3 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Identify and prioritize the top 2-3 potential obstacles Create and prioritize a list of potential obstacles that could reduce the efficacy of the Energy & Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
management and modernization to SEEK efficacy and implement processes to SEEK rollout over the lifecylce of the program. Environment immediately)
address them For top ~2-3+ potential obstacles, conduct a current state assessment, and
implement processes to better facilitate a successful roll-out. Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 DPS-1 E. Core tech modernization F3 Optimize shared service delivery Implement an agency-wide shared services Implement a shared services tracking system across all divisions to ensure the ability Public Safety Accountable Department
electronic, mobile-friendly tracking system to to check status of various products/processes electronically. It should also be enabled
increase efficiency and effectiveness of processes with electronic signature capabilities.
(contracts, grants, budget, etc.)
Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 ADH-12 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Implement cross-training to enhance task coverage Expand cross-training across the department to ensure that more than one person Health Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
system and knowledge continuity knows how to do critical tasks, thereby mitigating knowledge loss in the event of staff immediately)
attrition and reducing delays when staff are out or at capacity to ensure business
continuity and improve customer and employee experience
Prioritized
Medium Wave 2 PHT - 5 G. Revenue opportunity G3. Other funding mechanisms Implement dynamic pricing model to increase Improve park revenue and Arkansan experience through event-based dynamic Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 3. 100K-500K 0. 0% 1. Familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
revenue and park experience pricing model (e.g., weather, demand) Tourism Not prioritized citizens immediately)
Medium Wave 2 E&E - 10 H. Department-specific lever F2 Improve collaboration among agencies Implement social media strategy Assess, refine, and implement the existing E&E social media strategy proposal to Energy & Accountable Department 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
increase public trust and familiarity with E&E programs Environment Not prioritized immediately)
High priority Wave 2 DOC-7 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees Improve cross-agency collaboration Identify effective collaborations with other state agencies, such as Department of Corrections Accountable Department
Commerce, DHS, DOH, and the Department of Education to increase self
sufficiency, enhance public safety, and reduce recidivism. Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 ADH-8 D. Operational excellence D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Improve customer experience at local health units Expand surveys and leverage data to develop actionable strategies to improve Health Accountable Department 3. 100K-500K 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
through digitization customers' experience at local health units by identifying and eliminating pain points citizens immediately)
Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 DOC-8 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees Improve data quality and processes Improve data quality and processes Corrections Accountable Department
Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 E&E - 12 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Improve Department of Environmental Quality Improve Division of Environmental Quality (DEQ) permitting process and review to Energy & Accountable Department 4. 500k-1M citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
clarity (DEQ) permitting process and review streamline and expedite issuing denfensible and protective permits by: Environment immediately)
- Implementing a tiered review communication channel for permits to ensure all
necessary positions (e.g., geologists, engineers) are aware of applications in process
- Apply lean process mapping to streamline each permitting process to map and
quantify time for each step
- Encourage and facilitate permit applications to be submitted through a public-facing
smart form in SEEK, and require permits received through alternative channels to be
uploaded to the SEEK for processing
- Offer additional technical permit application support for local applicants applying for
permits
Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 E&E - 6 D. Operational excellence D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Improve E&E data transparency In conjunction with the SEEK program rollout, make public data readily available with Energy & Accountable Department 2. 10k-100k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
through digitization insightful visualizations in one place to increase knowledge of department programs Environment
Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 PHT - 14 D. Operational excellence D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Improve guest access to PHT offerings Adopt customer insights (e.g., feedback survey, visitation, and website data) to Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 5. 1M+ citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
through digitization optimize resource allocation (e.g., website redesign, printshop utilization) and Tourism unfamiliar immediately)
promotion of PHT experiences and resources Prioritized
Low Wave 2 ADLL-08 D. Operational excellence D1 Optimize AR citizen experience including Improve inspection prioritization and inspector Implement use of ARInspect to improve inspector visit planning, routing, and Labor & Licensing Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
through digitization routing using ARInspect documentation for all 11 inspector groups to reduce paperwork burden and travel
times Not prioritized
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
High priority Wave 2 DOC-5 D. Operational excellence E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Improve IT centralization to meet DOC needs Identify the best model for IT centralization that meets both the needs of shared Corrections Accountable Department
management and modernization services statewide, but also ensures that the needs of DOC IT are met in a more
efficient process. Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 DOC-1 D. Operational excellence F3 Optimize shared service delivery Improve purchasing processes Enhance the purchasing process by increasing efficiency, reducing errors, and Corrections Accountable Department
ensuring timely and complete deliverables from the Procurement Department
Prioritized
Medium Wave 2 PHT - 10 F. Agile organization F2 Improve collaboration among agencies Increase coordination between data teams Increase coordination between parks, heritage, and tourism's data analysis teams Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 1. Immediate and/or within the next 3 months (if begun immediately)
through cross-department GIS management to share insights and prevent duplicative Tourism
purchases of data assets Not prioritized
High priority Wave 2 ADVA-7 H. Department-specific lever None Increase public knowledge of benefits Increase knowledge of military benefits matching, long-term care, and funeral honors Veterans Affairs Accountable Department
by enhancing the distribution of educational materials through community
partnerships and other communication channels to expand veteran awareness of
ADVA benefits and increase the number of eligible veterans who receive benefits 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
Prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) unfamiliar immediately)
High priority Wave 2 DOC-3 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees Leverage training services across DOC divisions Determine the best use of training services for its employees and divisions Corrections Accountable Department
Prioritized
Medium Wave 2 PHT - 3 G. Revenue opportunity G1. Federal funding opportunities Maximize federal and state funding opportunities Identify funding opportunities not currently maximized (e.g., special revenues) and Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 2. 10K-100K citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
develop plans to access funding to increase program and service capacity (e.g., Tourism immediately)
along division priorities) and free up existing GR2 funding for other state and
departmental priorities Not prioritized
High priority Wave 2 DOTM-5 G. Revenue opportunity G1. Federal funding opportunities Maximize federal funding opportunities through re- Identify funding opportunities to increase program and service capacity and free up Military Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
configured state funding existing general revenue funding. Reassess and deprioritize non-critical building unfamiliar immediately)
projects to reduce capital spend by using alternative solutions (e.g., repurposing or
renovating instead of new buildings)
Prioritized
Medium Wave 2 ADVA-8 G. Revenue opportunity G1. Federal funding opportunities Maximize federal funds matching for VSOs through Review sources of federal funding for ADVA and identify where ADVA may not be Veterans Affairs Accountable Department
grant programs and legislation (e.g. CVSO Act of maximizing federal matching opportunities. Develop a plan to apply for funding to
2021) increase program and service capacity, freeing up existing general revenue funding 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
for other state and departmental priorities Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) unfamiliar immediately)
Medium Wave 2 ADVA-10 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees Measure, benchmark, and Benchmark the ROI and economic impact of ADVA per veteran population measured Veterans Affairs Accountable Department
communicate departmental ROI and impact against VAs in peer states to quantify departmental performance in a systematic way,
identify areas for improvement, and increase awareness of ADVA’s impact on the 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
state Not prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) unfamiliar immediately)
Low Wave 2 E&E - 11` E. Core tech modernization E4 Build new capabilities including cybersecurity Modernize DEQ and OGC websites Update DEQ and OGC websites to match the high-level customer experience, Energy & Accountable Department 4. 500k-1M citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
and analytics uniform department branding, or functionality of other E&E office websites Environment immediately)
Not prioritized
High priority Wave 2 ADVA-3 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Modify recruitment practices to sustainably staff Implement targeted and specific recruitment and hiring strategies for the veteran Veterans Affairs Accountable Department
clarity veteran cemeteries cemeteries to ensure adequate staffing and to remain compliant with Federal VA 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
stipulations, ensuring sustained federal funding Prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar immediately)
High priority Wave 2 PHT - 2 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Optimize manager roles and team size for better Take action on manager roles and team size to target appropriate spans of control for Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
clarity control and efficiency functions and management archetypes to more effectively deliver on the Tourism unfamiliar
departmental mission Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 ADH-9 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Optimize manager roles and team size for better Take action on manager roles and team size to target appropriate spans of control for Health Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
clarity control and efficiency functions and management archetypes to more effectively deliver on the
departmental mission Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 ADLL-01 D. Operational excellence F1 Streamline organization and improve role Optimize manager roles and team size for better Take action on manager roles and team size to target appropriate spans of control for Labor & Licensing Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
clarity control and efficiency functions and management archetypes to more effectively deliver on the unfamiliar immediately)
departmental mission Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 ADVA-5 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Optimize manager roles and team size for better Take action on manager roles and team size to target appropriate spans of control for Veterans Affairs Accountable Department
clarity control and efficiency functions and management archetypes to more effectively deliver on the 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
departmental mission Prioritized 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) unfamiliar immediately)
High priority Wave 2 DOTM-4 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Optimize manager roles and team size for better Take action on manager roles and team size to target appropriate spans of control for Military Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
clarity control and efficiency functions and management archetypes to more effectively deliver on the
departmental mission Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 E&E - 1 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Optimize manager roles and team size for better Take action on manager roles and team size to target appropriate spans of control for Energy & Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1.Familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
clarity control and efficiency functions and management archetypes to more effectively deliver on the Environment
departmental mission Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 DOTM-2 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff Optimize payroll accuracy for the National Guard Digitize manual elements of the National Guard (NG) payroll system. Reduce manual Military Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
through digitization processing errors that currently lead to pay delays, errors, and overpayments unfamiliar immediately)
Prioritized
Wave 2 PHT - 1 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Promote PHT specific attraction and retention Supplement work of Office of Personnel Management by promoting PHT specific Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
system activities tools to attract (e.g., new sources of talent) and retain (e.g., skill development) Tourism immediately)
High priority employees Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 ADLL-11 F. Agile organization F2 Improve collaboration among agencies Rationalize agency board structures Simplify agency board structures by consolidating boards for similar trades to reduce Labor & Licensing Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
administrative workload and improve license application cycle time immediately)
Prioritized
Low Wave 2 ADLL-16 H. Department-specific lever None Rationalize scope of State Athletics Commission Rationalize scope of State Athletics Commission by privatizing administration of Labor & Licensing Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
boxing matches while department retains permitting. Athletic Commission oversees unfamiliar immediately)
boxing and is responsible for administering the match promotion, staffing, judging,
and scoring Not prioritized
High priority Wave 2 E&E - 5 G. Revenue opportunity B3 Optimize procurement processes for speed Redesign internal processes around reviewing and Redesign internal processes around reviewing and tracking grant allocation in E&E, Energy & Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1.Familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
and value tracking grant allocation in E&E with the goal of reducing time employees spend on unnecessary review and Environment immediately)
information requests Prioritized
Medium Wave 2 PHT - 6 D. Operational excellence D2 Improve dynamic staffing and staff productivity Reimagine welcome center support with ARDOT Collaborate with ARDOT to staff welcome centers and realign PHT employees to Parks, Heritage, and Accountable Department 3. 100K-500K 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
tools more mission-oriented roles Tourism Not prioritized citizens immediately)
High priority Wave 2 E&E - 4 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Reskill and upskill E&E employees Expand cross-training to 1) Ensure that more than one person knows how to do Energy & Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1.Familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
system critical tasks at E&E, thereby reducing delays/hold-ups when they are out or at Environment immediately)
capacity, and 2) provide motivated employees with opportunities to build their skill set
and advance in their careers at E&E Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 ADLL-02 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Restructure ADLL funding to single appropriation Restructure agency operations with single appropriation to enable strategic Labor & Licensing Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
clarity management of budget across divisions and improve organizational effectiveness unfamiliar immediately)
and ability to develop and execute strategic priorities to advance departmental
mission. Prioritized
Medium Wave 2 ADLL-12 F. Agile organization F2 Improve collaboration among agencies Restructure intra-department cost allocation Restructure intra-department cost allocation policies by reducing the number of Labor & Licensing Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
policies indirect cost rates (from four rates to two covering executive shared services users, immediately)
agency shared services users, DOL, and federal grants), cost distributions (rent
allocation, parking, paper, copier leases, and office supplies) to reduce administrative
workload Not prioritized
High priority Wave 2 DOC-4 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees Revise leadership training Revise leadership training within the Training Unit to address management Corrections Accountable Department
inconsistencies within the Department. Will address leadership skills at various levels
for all agency divisions. Prioritized
Initiative information Impact measurement
Priority? Wave Initiative # Initiative category (lever) Initiative sub-category (sub-lever) Initiative name Initiative Description Accountable Enterprise vs department Priority category Positive citizen Positive employee Familiarity Timeline
Department impact impact impact
(quantitative) (quantitative)
Low Wave 2 ADLL-10 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Simplify yearly IT planning process Simplify yearly IT planning process to reduce administrative burden and workload by Labor & Licensing Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
clarity ~2% - 4% of annual labor hours for all involved employees. This would result in a immediately)
reduction from 18 separate plans to a single plan for the entire department
Not prioritized
Medium Wave 2 ADLL-09 F. Agile organization F1 Streamline organization and improve role Standardize department finance policies and Standardize ADLL's finance policies and procedures for Accounts Receivable, Labor & Licensing Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
clarity procedures Allowance for Doubtful accounts, Abatements, Cash Receipting, and Travel immediately)
Regulations to reduce agency siloes and audit findings. This streamlining should save
~40 work hours per year Not prioritized
Medium Wave 2 ADH-2 E. Core tech modernization E4 Build new capabilities including cybersecurity Streamline grant management Create standard processes and consider shared functions (e.g., new software) for Health Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
and analytics grant monitoring and reporting to ensure federal grant opportunities are maximized immediately)
and reduce re-work and coordination challenges
Not prioritized
High priority Wave 2 DOTM-1 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Streamline information sharing in DOTM through Aim to unify federal and state IT applications. Develop solution to either integrate Military Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 3. Somewhat 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
management and modernization federal-state integration DOTM federal employees into state systems and programs (e.g., AASIS, EASE) or unfamiliar immediately)
create new secure data transfer portal
Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 DPS-7 D. Operational excellence D3 Use automation to empower staff Understand current obstacles to decommissioning Automate the MR distribution process to improve the experience of removing surplus Public Safety Accountable Department
state police vehicles state police vehicles and non usable equipment /property from State Police
automotive.
Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 ADH-5 E. Core tech modernization E2 Increase efficiency of IT resources through Update and/or replace Electronic Health Records Replace current EHR system with system that performs better for local health units, Health Accountable Department 2. 10K-100K citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 5. Benefit captured post-June 2026 (if begun immediately)
management and modernization (EHR) system is more interoperable with other system, and centralizes and simplifies billing (e.g.,
using outsourcing or automated insurance lookup) to reduce time spent on billing,
improve reporting capabilities, and address revenue leakage
Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 ADH-4 D. Operational excellence D4 Ensure ROI from state programs and grantees Update billing system to facilitate reporting Update billing forms and intake process at local health units to provide more Health Accountable Department 3. 100K-500K 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
accuracy guardrails on form accuracy (e.g., include multiple "hard stops" affirming that citizens immediately)
customers are reporting accurately) and incorporate new technology (e.g., automate
and/or outsource insurance lookup, integrate new EHR system) to support accurate
insurance information, reducing employee rework and ensuring available insurance
payments and revenue are accounted for
Prioritized
Medium Wave 2 ADLL-15 F. Agile organization F2 Improve collaboration among agencies Update department funding rules Update department funding rules to reduce use of SGR by allowing licensing board Labor & Licensing Accountable Department 0. 0 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 2. Somewhat familiar 4. Benefit could be captured by end of June 2026 (if begun
fund balances and surpluses from special revenues to be used across department immediately)
Not prioritized
High priority Wave 2 ADH-1 F. Agile organization None Update Staff Action Summary (SAS) review Upgrade Staff Action Summary (SAS) review system to streamline process, improve Health Accountable Department 1. <10K citizens 2. 5-15% (~3,000) 1. Familiar 3. Benefit could be captured by the end of June 2025 (if begun
system clarity of guidance, leverage electronic system, provide training, and bring "positive" immediately)
lens to increase throughput, decrease administrative burden on reviewers, and
improve experience for requesters Prioritized
High priority Wave 2 ADVA-2 A. Personnel A3 Identify areas needed to build long-term talent Upskilling County and District VSOs Improve standards of excellence and training accessibility for District VSOs (DVSO) Veterans Affairs Accountable Department
system and County VSOs (CVSO) to increase the number and percentage of successful 2. Benefit could be captured in the next 6 months (if begun
veteran benefits claims Prioritized 1. <10k citizens 1. 0-5% (~1,000) 1. Familiar immediately)
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