Streamlining workflows at Philadelphia Federal Credit Union (PFCU)
Table of contents
PFCU upgraded its process management by eliminating all manual processes and now has improved visibility, better tracking, and shorter turnaround times.
Background
Philadelphia Federal Credit Union (PFCU)(opens in a new tab) provides banking services for the underserved community in Philadelphia. Products and services offered include savings/checking accounts, consumer loans, business loans, and mortgages.
PFCU has more than 116,000 members; serves 400 organizations throughout Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware; and has more than $1 billion in assets. Its objective is to ensure its members’ financial security by providing a devoted and one-of-a-kind blend of professional and personal service.
“There’s no more chasing people around trying to figure out the status of something.”
The challenge
Before finding Nutrient Workflow, PFCU had internal processes in place, but many required manual steps that slowed down turnaround times. In addition, it wasn’t always easy for staff to know the correct procedures for processes, requiring additional phone calls and emails to ensure proper handling.
For instance, due to inefficient approval management, vendor contracts and other documents needing review had to be walked around the office to different departments for approvals, updates, and other actions. Greenberg estimated that 50 percent of the time, a contract never made it to imaging for finalization.
Additionally, PFCU employees had to manually document the status of each document as it moved through the process. This created inconsistencies in how and when the status of each contract would be communicated and forced staff to check in repeatedly. It was clear that there were improvements to be made in tracking document requests and approvals.
Implementation
PFCU initially reached out to Nutrient Workflow for automating HR processes. After seeing that other functions could be improved, it decided to automate other departments’ processes as well. The team started by rolling out processes and training specifically for management. Once acclimated, these managers found that the new, automated workflow improved the previous processes, and excitement over automation began to build.
The team created a shared spreadsheet matrix to track which processes employees wanted automated next. According to Greenberg, “We used a spreadsheet where everyone would fill out what processes they wanted to be turned into an automated workflow. For example, how many departments does it affect, our members/customers, will it help them, and so on.”
By working collaboratively with staff and using this process priority matrix, PFCU began building the automated processes that delivered the most value.
“Every workflow form is self-explanatory, and I know that turnaround time has definitely improved.”
What it has built
Currently, process end users are primarily managers and vice presidents. A small percentage of workflows have been designed for general staff, including branch employees, call center employees, and back office employees.
The automated processes eliminated manual tasks like physically routing vendor contracts between managers, tracking contract status via email, and maintaining paper logs.
To date, PFCU has built the following workflows:
- New job title
- Initial employee request
- Internal hire
- External hire
- Internal employee setup
- External employee setup
- Separation of employment
- Employee name change
- Employee status change
- Employee job title change
- Vendor contracts
- Leave of absence
- Educational assistance
- Compliance review
- Marketing collateral request
- Universal PTO buyback
- Member complaint
- Branch incident report
- Power of attorney
- Benefits
These workflows help PFCU maintain accountability through a live, visual tracker that shows each process’s stage, where it stopped, why, and who needs to act next.
The workflows also helped PFCU become paperless. Users now upload digital documents as part of the workflow, reducing paper use while creating visibility for all users.
Get real-world examples of how Nutrient Workflow works in financial operations.
Currently, PFCU isn’t tracking KPIs or other metrics, but it plans to incorporate them in the future. Greenberg has begun tracking how long processes take from start to finish and the number of completed processes for each workflow via Nutrient Workflow’s dashboards and reports.
“We’re working on beginning to track those metrics,” she shared. “However, I’ve received a tremendous amount of feedback describing how easy processes are. Staff no longer have to dig through email folders to find out when something was sent over.”
Overall, the workflows help maintain consistency across all users instead of different departments handling things differently.
What’s next?
Outside of management, general staff doesn’t yet have much experience with Nutrient Workflow, but that will change in the coming months as PFCU rolls out more automated workflows.
