The Mayor’s Action Center in Indianapolis receives over 200,000 calls each year, mostly to inform local government about issues like broken traffic signals, stray animals, illegal dumping, abandoned vehicles and graffiti. MAC’s work is a massive endeavor and great public service, but according to StarWatch, “they print out Web forms and send them in interoffice mail to the appropriate department.”

The process may sound gobsmackingly backward, but the problems are significant. The Indianapolis Star interviewed resident Mark Hudson, who publicized the issues:

When concerned citizens submit a complaint via the Web site or call after hours, they have no automatic way to get a tracking number. Hudson has had to get follow-up information by calling during business hours to ask the person manning the phone to search through his requests. “A Web tracking tool would be a logical next step to reduce this added work and reduce calls,” he said. “I know the city is in a budget crunch, but with all the technology that exists, there has to be a low-cost way to share information more quickly.”

Organizations constrained by their current methodology not only suffer from reduced productivity as well as client and employee satisfaction, but will eventually face public scrutiny. If you are operating less than optimally, contact Slaughter Development to assess your processes!

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