Workflow design & development
Unifying a fragmented compensation workflow
Several departments, several manual processes, one landowner waiting to be paid. We replaced the whole chain with a single platform working from a single dataset.
One shared platform. No repeated case-data entry between departments.
The challenge
When new power lines are installed, the utility must compensate every affected landowner for land, property and vegetation losses. Each of those components was assessed by a different department, each keeping its own records and doing its own calculations by hand.
Nothing was shared. A single case moved between departments as paperwork, was re-keyed at every handover, and stalled whenever one team was behind. Calculations, notifications, payments and reporting were all slow, and errors from duplicate data entry were routine. The people most affected, landowners with no visibility into the process, waited the longest.
What we did
We started by mapping the workflow as it actually ran, not as the manual described it, including the informal steps staff had invented to work around the gaps. That map showed the same data being recreated at every handover.
- One dataset. Every department reads and writes the same case record, so a valuation entered once is visible everywhere immediately.
- One platform. Assessment, calculation, approval, notification and payment run as connected stages rather than separate systems.
- Automated calculation and routing. Compensation is computed from the shared record and moves to the next approver without anyone chasing it.
- Designed around the staff. Screens follow the order people actually work in, which is why the new process was adopted rather than bypassed.
Results
- Increased efficiency: centralised data and automated key steps cut both processing time and administrative cost.
- Improved accuracy: eliminating redundant data handling removed a whole class of errors.
- Better collaboration: cross-departmental communication became part of the system instead of a phone call.
A complex, fragmented process became an efficient one that staff can run and landowners can follow.
Recognise this pattern?
Multi-department processes that each work fine alone and fail together are the most common thing we are asked to fix. The first step is usually two weeks, not two years.