Programs + Projects
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Continuous Administrative Service Improvement Program (CASIP)
The improvement of business processes is a top priority for the university. To address this priority, the Continuous Administrative Service Improvement Program (CASIP) was developed to review critical business processes across the university to improve and streamline process. Led by the University Initiatives Office (UIO), CASIP will improve the experience of users who access U of A services, and of users navigating and working within these processes.
University services and finance Initiatives
The University Services and Finance (USF) initiatives were developed to fix and improve process for the university community in key areas including recruitment, employee appointment, contracts, payments, salary & benefit adjustments and research finance. Note: The USF Initiatives are now part of the Continual Administrative Service Improvement Program (CASIP).
Learn more: Process redesign and system improvements in the University Services and Finance Portfolio
Research Administration Process Redesign
The Office of the Vice-President (Research and Innovation) is committed to improving the researcher experience through standardized, efficient and effective administrative processes. A project was launched in Fall of 2022 with the mapping of end-to-end research administration activities. This process leveraged discovery work completed during SET, existing data analysis, and stakeholder consultation. The result was a prioritization of processes that needed improvement, and the work was grouped into bundles:
- Pre-award - Research administration workflow (i.e. online approvals) - opportunity to reduce the number of approvals needed and to streamlining the overall process
- Post-award - Transactional activities - opportunity to reduce the number salary and benefit adjustments from research activities and streamlining the process when SBAs are required
- Review of research ethics processes
Work on this first phase of this project is expected to be completed by Spring 2023.
Learn more: Reducing Wait Times in Research Services
Research Partners Network Expansion & Workstream Update
Work Integrated Learning (College of Health Sciences)
As the new U of A Operating Model continues to be operationalized, opportunities exist for certain aspects of administration to be coordinated at the College level, to ensure that services are coordinated that processes are optimized. The College of Health Sciences was the first to explore this for Work Integrated Learning - in this case classified as clinical and non-clinical placements. Representatives from each of the CHS faculties participated in workshops to confirm current processes and jointly develop future state process maps for three areas - agreements, student documentation and data entry into student placement systems. Implementation of these new processes is expected in Summer 2023.
Intranet Exploration Project
The University of Alberta (U of A) has long recognized the need for an institution-wide intranet. By definition, a modern intranet is a digital workplace hub. It connects people, promotes communication and collaboration, and helps employees be more informed and productive. An effective intranet is built around the four key areas of purpose, practice, events, and interests, and takes into careful consideration the integration of accessibility, content, tools and resources and social and cultural aspects of an organization.
An intranet would enable the university to focus on curating materials that are relevant to and reserved for faculty and staff, and it would ensure that the external website presents content that best serves the general public. This delineation will improve the overall user experience for both internal and external audiences.
A project team has been established to conduct a needs assessment that will determine the viability of a University of Alberta intranet. The intranet exploration project team is currently carrying out Phase-1, namely, the requirements gathering stage and current state analysis by consulting with staff and faculty, the two groups that are within the scope of this exercise. A well-appointed university intranet would provide immense benefit, support and value to these users given their day-to-day needs.
Workshops with various groups began in November 2023, and continue to progress. These consultations enable the project team to examine how users currently engage with the university’s web content to do their work. At the same time, the project team continues to gather business requirements, and identify key partners for this project.
The intranet exploration project team aims to have sufficient information to present to the project sponsors within the next 8-10 months, with the overarching goal of obtaining the go-ahead to pursue the full development and implementation of a University of Alberta intranet.
This project is sponsored by the offices of the Vice-President, External Relations, and the Vice-President, University Services and Finance.