In 2010 the Arbor Day Foundation started using Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2009 as its ERP. While implementing this system it was determined it should be the system for all information beyond a standard ERP, like customer marketing preferences, management of direct mailings, and membership management. This created a system that was extremely customized and the cost of updating each year and carrying over the numerous customizations was not sustainable.

Fast forward to 2016. The Arbor Day Foundation was still using NAV 2009, but made the commitment to update the system. This type of change required a significant shift in thinking in how we did our work across the organization, as many of the customizations needed to be removed or moved to different applications. It also provided an opportunity for improvement in our processes, if we could get people to question how they did their work.

Any organization that wants to encourage a continuous improvement mindset knows that getting people to question how they’ve always done their work or identifying value adding vs non-value adding activities can be a challenge. You will hear what we tried, what worked, and what didn’t. You will also learn how we utilized a group of user advocates who learned how to question their work, which in turn helped our organization make significant changes to long-held business processes. You will learn from our successes and mistakes and we will share some tools we used to help stakeholders question how they’ve always done their work and identify the value of their work. What we will share can be used for large and small projects.

Attendees will learn:

• Methods you can use to question current business processes and how to help stakeholders identify value.
• How to build and support a group of user advocates focused on improving processes
• Techniques to approach difficult conversations with stakeholders regarding their processes

Presenter: Jason Cruise

Jason Cruise is currently a Business Analyst in IT at the Arbor Day Foundation. In this role, he has worked with teams across the organization all the while questioning and working to improving their processes. He previously spent 13 years working in higher education working with the graduate admission application process. In 2016 He received his MBA from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln specializing in Supply Chain Management with a focus on Lean.

Members: FREE (must renew membership prior to registering)

Non-Members: $100 per person