Jayhawks Elevate: KU's continuous improvement program processes more than 300 ideas

LAWRENCE — A team of University of Kansas employees wanted to improve a process in how benefits were administered to KU student veterans: Not only was the current method time-consuming, but it could also generate duplicate awards that led to incorrect disbursements.

Adam Phillips with Student Accounts and Tamara Horner with the KU Military-Affiliated Student Center replaced a manual spreadsheet process, then further refined workflow steps so sponsorships would be administered through a structured sequence, preventing future errors.

“Any time we are working with students and their financial situation, accuracy and efficiency is key,” said Mandy Tucker, director of Student Accounts and Receivables.

The team’s solution is just one of the proposals that have been processed through Jayhawks Elevate, the KU continuous improvement initiative that seeks to enhance operations, the educational environment and community engagement — one idea at a time.

In a little more than three years, the program has received 320 suggestions, visible on the Jayhawks Elevate dashboard, and enacted changes that have saved the university tens of thousands of dollars. Craig Alexander, senior director of Jayhawks Elevate, said he hopes to see more ideas from the KU community to introduce efficiencies, solutions and cost savings and to identify new revenue streams.

“How do we consistently create an environment that fosters the sharing of issues and solving them together?” he said. “That’s what we’re trying to accomplish.”

Alexander said improvement projects largely fall under three categories: processes, the KU experience and finances. Those projects have stemmed from both staff and faculty suggestions, from solving cumbersome processes to saving KU thousands of dollars. Some highlights:

• Lawrence Chapman with Maintenance Services noticed that the City of Lawrence was collecting trash more often than needed over summer and winter breaks. KU Facilities then partnered with the city to reduce the frequency of pickups, saving KU about $24,000 a year.
• The Jayhawks Elevate team discovered several KU units paid different document storage fees to the same vendor. The team renegotiated the pricing for an annual savings of $60,000 across the Lawrence and Medical Center campuses combined.
• Several other “success stories” can be viewed on the Jayhawks Elevate website.

As of March, an additional 53 ideas were being actively evaluated.

“People say, ‘I don’t have a $20 million idea.’ We don’t need a $20 million idea,” Alexander said. “It’d be great if we had one, but we don’t need that.”

Instead, he said, small savings here and there will help in the long run, along with solutions that make the workday go more smoothly.

“The connection of changing the culture and achieving what we all really want in the long run is for our people to be taken care of and not frustrated by ‘how we’ve always done it,’” Alexander said.

Creating efficiencies are pivotal as the university continues to manage its budget in the coming years to reinvest in employees, but the more important impacts of continuous improvement programs like Jayhawks Elevate are cultural, according to Jeff DeWitt, chief financial officer and senior vice chancellor.

“We need input from every part of the organization to navigate the current challenges in higher education,” DeWitt said. “The most effective teams are those who feel safe enough to challenge the current direction and are empowered to solve challenges they care deeply about.”

While the project is currently based at the Lawrence and Edwards campuses, the suggestion submission process now includes a portal where KU Medical Center employees can submit ideas.

“When our teams have opportunities to collaborate on solutions that improve both their work lives and student outcomes, they create a better KU,” Alexander said.

Tucker has seen that side effect, too. In addition to the student veterans project, she has served on change agent teams for other Jayhawks Elevate processes, including streamlining how employee tuition assistance is processed.

“I think the most important part of all of these projects that I have been a part of is the partnership across departments and the campus,” she said. “We tend to be siloed into our roles and the roles of our individual offices. When we are able to discuss a process with all stakeholders in the conversation, we’re able to update the process in a manner that works best for the group, and with that, it makes the university better all around.”

Alexander said since the launch of Jayhawks Elevate, he was surprised to hear employees say they never expected to see their suggestion made into reality.

“What we can do is — as long as people are bringing their ideas over time — is change that kind of perspective by saying, ‘We want to hear from you, and we will follow up.’”