In February, the Bloomington Purchasing Department surveyed fiscal officers and asked three questions:
- In your experience, what have you found that Purchasing does well or where do we add value?
- What can we do to improve?
- Please give examples of recent experiences with Purchasing. What went well and what did not go well?
The response was terrific. 68 people submitted feedback. Of those, 64 (94 %) left positive remarks. 46 (67 %) offered suggestions for improvement.
After carefully reviewing the data, faculty and staff identified four areas where Purchasing could most improve. The Purchasing Department met to discuss these opportunities, as well as possible solutions.
Below, you fill find the results of our meeting. We hope you see improvement in these areas over the course of the next few months.
Opportunity
Respondents commented that Purchasing is slow to reply to phone calls, emails, and other requests for help.
Possible Solutions
• Ask other Purchasing staff members for help if it is needed.
• Arrange for an e-mail etiquette training.
• Respond to phone calls within 24 hours.
• Call back/reply to emails immediately to let the person know you got their message. Follow up with an answer as soon as possible.
• Put out-of-office messages on phones when gone for the afternoon.
Opportunity
Need better contact information/staff directory.
Possible Solutions
• Purchasing is in the process of developing a new website. The new site will feature an improved staff directory and more prominent contact information.
Opportunity
EPIC is confusing and difficult to use.
Possible Solutions:
• Consider offering an EPIC class for advanced users.
• Continue to promote monthly EPIC training for beginners. Increase training for general Purchasing concepts to twice a year.
Opportunity
Policy and procedure changes should be communicated more quickly. Staff members want better access to information.
Possible Solutions
• Sign more people up for the Purchasing and EPIC listservs so the information gets in front of a larger percentage of our audience.
• Increase the newsletter frequency to once a month.
• Give policy changes more prominence in the newsletter.
• Create an index of articles on the Purchasing website so people can find the article by subject rather than by month.
Your thoughts? An opportunity we’ve missed? Solutions we haven’t considered?
Filed under: Bloomington Events/Training , Bloomington, feedback, opportunities, Purchasing, solutions, survey