Evidencing
Benefits Approach
Key stakeholders
Research and Knowledge Exchange Services (RKES) recognised a need to improve the Postgraduate Research (PGR) Studentship process (from allocation of Studentship funds to Faculties, to the student receiving their first stipend payment) across all Faculties and Professional Services. The existing process missed opportunities to recruit excellent students, with significant levels of duplicated effort required to allocate funding later in the academic cycle. The current approach was causing delays for some students who were unable to register at the start of their programme.
Objectives
Project Team
Months 2 - 4
Scoping
Process mapping workshops & baseline
data capture
Creation of new process & enhancements to system
Implementation
Lessons Learned
A Deputy Associate Principal took on the role of project champion and was central to generating engagement and ownership across all Faculties and Professional Services.
Project Champion
The role of the project champion is clearly important. What type of project activities were they involved in?
Did the project team consider engaging with students to get their feedback?
Student
Support
Research
Academics
• To improve the student and staff experience
• To establish clear roles and responsibilities for all staff and departments involved
• To reduce the risk of under/overspend of PGR Studentship funds
• To reduce processing time through the elimination of wastes and duplication
• To establish clear roles and responsibilities for all staff and departments involved
• To reduce the risk of under/overspend of PGR Studentship funds
• To reduce processing time through the elimination of wastes and duplication
About the Team
Testimonials
Context
Post-improvement Data Capture
Q
&
A
@
The Business Improvement Team (BIT) sits within the Continuous Improvement Directorate. The team was established in May 2013 and since then has grown to eight people. Our remit is to work across the university to streamline processes and help staff improve their way of working, leading to efficiency savings and increased income generation. A key aspect of what we do is encourage behavioural change towards a culture of continuous improvement aligned with achieving our strategic objectives, and to empower staff to make changes in work practices regardless of their role in the university.
Case Study Contact
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Evidencing Benefits
Case Study
Postgraduate Research
Studentships
Produced by Business Improvement Team, University of Strathclyde
Q
A
Q
A
8
Research &
Knowledge
Exchange
Timeline
Month 1
The following benefits were identified up front and communicated to the project team through the project proposal. These potential benefits were discussed throughout the duration of the project.
Long-Term Strategic Benefits
Observable /
Behavioural Benefits
Stakeholder Benefits
Measurable Benefits
• Greater understanding and buy-in to strategic vision of process
• Improved communication between stakeholders
• Transparent understanding of roles and responsibilities
• Increased staff collaboration between Faculties and Professional Services
• Improved communication between stakeholders
• Transparent understanding of roles and responsibilities
• Increased staff collaboration between Faculties and Professional Services
• Improved student experience - NSS student satisfaction (overall)
Benefit
Description of Measure
Improved student experience.
Time between students applying for funding & receiving confirmation of funding letter.
Data Required & Collection Method
ID
Measurable Benefits Data Plan
A
B
C
D
E
Improved service through reduced processing time.
Increased quality of applications through reduction in queries.
Increased compliance with the process deadlines.
Staff capacity savings.
System reports of time stamps of student application received and funding letter sent.
System and manual reports of time stamps of applications submitted, approved and advertised.
Number of email queries as a proportion of total applications.
Manual count of email queries and total number of funding applications.
Number of applications for research funding submitted after the deadline as a proportion to total applications submitted.
Number of applications submitted after the deadline.
Total number of applications submitted.
Total number of applications submitted.
Staff time spent working on the funding administration process.
Manual capture of staff time responding to emails.
Manual count of total emails received.
Manual count of total emails received.
Baseline
data
capture
Benefits Exploration Map
This was one of the first business improvement projects that had equal representation of academics, administrators and professional services staff. The use of the data helped the project team to address any incorrect assumptions up front, and focus on designing solutions that would improve the overall student and staff experience. The
• Work practices demonstrating the University values
• Greater awareness and understanding of the end-to-end process
• Increased compliance with process and deadlines
• Increased compliance with process and deadlines
Post-improvement data capture was originally intended to be at the start of the academic year. In reality, this was only the beginning of the post-improvement data capture which needed to be captured throughout a full academic cycle (October to September). This realisation has since informed other improvement initiatives.
• Improved student experience
• Improved service through reduced processing time
• Increased quality of applications through reduction in queries
• Increased compliance with research funding deadlines
• Staff capacity savings
• Improved service through reduced processing time
• Increased quality of applications through reduction in queries
• Increased compliance with research funding deadlines
• Staff capacity savings
Baseline data of the previous
12 months uncovered:
The baseline data was located on a Data Wall within the dedicated project room and was presented in a number of ‘End of Diagnostic’ workshops to key stakeholders from the Executive Team, Professional Services, and all Faculties. The post-improvement data was monitored closely by the core project team throughout the full academic year of implementation.
• Increased total PGR population
A Measurable Benefits Data Plan was created and used to clearly communicate the importance of the data capture for evidencing the benefits of the project with the Project Team. The Data Plan was reviewed regularly to update the team on the progress made:
End-to-end process time from academics applying for funding to when the studentship is advertised to applicants.
for applicant to receive a confirmation letter
49
days
Impact of Approach
Realised
Benefits
Behavioural
Change
The project champion identified key stakeholders who should be consulted and who would be crucial for embracing the new approach. They were actively involved in the design of the new process and provided a strategic foreword to the staff guide. They officially launched the new process to academic research staff and repeatedly reinforced the new way of working to ensure ongoing sustainment, and continuous improvement.
The team did explore this and discussed the challenges around gaining feedback from students who received funding, did not receive funding, or who were allocated funding and decided to undertake their research at another institution. Existing surveys such as the PRES and the internal student survey were evaluated to identify if there was anything that could be used. However none of the existing questions provided suitable data for the project. The team considered adding a question to the existing internal survey but the timescales would not have provided true baseline data for the project.
Increased
Quality
Increased Compliance
Staff Capacity
Savings
to agree allocation
of funding
50
days
43%
of process wastes identified a lack of clarity over the purpose of funding and responsibilities across
the process
of research funding applications were
submitted after
the deadline
• Increased number of PGR awards (per annum and per academic staff)
50% reduction in
e-mail queries
75% reduction in applications submitted after the deadline
82% reduction in waiting time from student applying for funding to receiving confirmation
50% reduction in staff time spent responding to queries
Information Services
Finance
Marketing &
Communication
Post-improvement data capture & realisation of benefits
• Increased PGR satisfaction
• Increased operating surplus
of e-mails supporting the process
1000s
75%
Missed
Deadlines
Staff survey revealed deadlines missed due to ineffective communications and marketing
£
staff survey uncovered that many challenges faced were a result of inaccuracies and missing information at the start of the process, causing recurrent rework at the end, helping to remove a long-standing blame culture towards other departments. The visual Data Wall was a powerful tool for communicating the need to deliver the improvements and generating engagement with other key stakeholders.
Allocation of studentship funding reduced from
50 days to 1 day.
PGR Officer
University of
Strathclyde
"
I have found the project very beneficial as it helped us understand our stakeholder requirements allowing us to improve our processes.
"
"
A number of improvements have been implemented to streamline the process and maximise the efficiencies surrounding the allocation of funding. The overall scheme has been renamed to reflect its purpose and provide clearer meaning to staff, as well as the students, who have the potential to make a positive impact at Strathclyde.
"
Deputy Associate Principal
Improved
Student
Experience
Improved Service
University of
Strathclyde
All studentships advertised
7 months earlier.
£
Months 5 - 9
Months 10 - 22
Months 23 - 25