Crisis Management: 4 Ways to Use Policy & Training Software

With policy management software like PowerDMS, you can keep your staff informed, well prepared, and as safe as possible during these uncertain times.

December 28, 2020

Highlights from March 2020

  • 20% increase in daily active PowerDMS users
  • 81,000 new documents created in March 2020
  • 13+ million views of new documents
  • 5+ million E-signatures on new documents

Protect Your Organization & Staff With Policy Software

We are living through history. “Surviving” may be a more appropriate word. Like many historical events, we will all remember the year 2020. The year COVID-19 changed our nation and the world.

Many of these changes have revolved around the economy and employment. How has your job been affected? How has your organization responded to COVID-19? How has your organization communicated with a remote workforce?

Now more than ever, organizations need an efficient way of creating, updating, and distributing policies to employees. While this is true of all industries, it’s particularly important if you’re in the public sector.

Our public servants are on the frontline. With much of the population under lockdown, our healthcare providers, law enforcement agencies, and first responders serve us every day in the trenches.

Healthcare professionals need training on how to interact with infected patients. Police officers need to access life-saving procedures in the field, quickly. Remote employees need to access and sign off on coronavirus-related announcements.

With policy management software like PowerDMS, you can keep your staff informed, well prepared, and as safe as possible during these uncertain times.

In this article, we will explore four ways customers have used PowerDMS to manage policies and communicate with employees in the middle of the coronavirus crisis. The best part? You get to hear it from our customers directly.

Let’s start by looking at the numbers.

Policy Management Statistics

At the height of the coronavirus pandemic, customers used PowerDMS to create, distribute, and track important policies and announcements. In fact, we saw a 20% increase in daily active users during this time. Our customers created roughly 81,000 new documents in March of 2020, which received more than 13.5 million views and over 5 million E-signatures.

While very few organizations have been able to continue with “business as usual,” PowerDMS has helped customers maintain essential operations. In Q1 of 2020, when compared to Q4 of 2019, we saw a 25% increase in total document views and a 32% increase in total signatures. That equates to 12.5+ million employees verifying that they have read and understood crucial policies and memos.

We like to think of it as 12.5+ million people who are safer, better prepared, and equipped to protect their organization.

Now that we understand at a high level how organizations have been using PowerDMS, let’s dive deeper into several customer stories.

4 Ways Customers Have Used Policy Software

We asked customers how they’re using PowerDMS to respond to the coronavirus. How are they keeping employees informed and safe? What suggestions do they have for other organizations? This is what we learned from them. These are their stories.

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1. Policy Dissemination & Tracking

Todd Townsend is the Senior Training Specialist for the City of Austin, TX Code Department. He had some valuable insights about communicating despite the extended lockdown.

“PowerDMS is the new vehicle for disseminating new docs and policies. This [pandemic] is going to be a long haul for everyone, and PowerDMS will be a key component in communicating without the need for close contact.

The City of Austin uses PowerDMS to roll out response plans, team tasks, and a variety of policy changes. The traffic on PowerDMS for us will increase exponentially.”

Todd Townsend

Meet Sherianne, the Professional Standards Coordinator for Addison Consolidated Dispatch Center in Illinois. As an avid PowerDMS user, she offered some helpful advice.

“I recommend reissuing policies and creating refresher courses for review and signature regarding evacuation policies, emergency operations procedures, etc…emergency operations are not something handled routinely, and staff may not remember those policies and procedures they signed off on. Preparedness is key. Getting everyone up to speed with emergency procedures is critical in handling this pandemic.”

Sherianne Hermes

Michael is the Accreditation Officer for Cedar Rapids Police Department in Iowa. Learn how his team has used policy software to eliminate the spreading of germs.

“When documents come out requiring confirmation via signature, they are sent out through PowerDMS due to the ease of tracking and to prevent passing a document around to everyone for signature, eliminating a possible medium for a virus to spread.”

Michael Hass

Meet Marisha, the Administrative Assistant at OrthoIllinois Surgery Center. Learn how she replaced face-to-face staff meetings.

“In lieu of staff meetings, for the time being, we are publishing newsletters to PowerDMS and assigning them to staff. Same content, just no catered breakfast and coffee.

We just published an Emerging Infectious Disease policy that goes over new protocols and processes. We always do annual hand hygiene training.”

Marisha Staub

As customers like Todd and Sherianne have discovered, PowerDMS lets you draft, revise, disseminate, and track policies across their entire lifecycle. You can create multiple levels of access and track revisions every step of the way to increase accountability. You will know when employees were notified about a policy, when they opened it, and when they signed it. Interested in learning more?

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2. Training Management

As the Principal Secretary at Knoxville Police Department, Marci explained how her team has been using training management software.

“We’ve been using PowerDMS for training that we’d normally have in a classroom setting, to minimize the amount of time or need for face-to-face interaction.

We’ve used it to send out videos created by our Fire Department about Doffing PPE and information to the officers concerning decontamination, if the need arises.”

Marci Ware

Stephanie is the Assistant Accreditation Manager and Training Coordinator for McHenry Police Department in Illinois. She offered some helpful advice.

“Keep the most up to date suggestions for how to combat COVID-19 and your agency’s current state (what is open, who is working from home, etc). Also include reference guides so they are quickly available if an officer or dispatcher comes in contact with someone in need of assistance.

Our dispatch has new protocols for their emergency medical dispatch. This, along with a written directive, were issued through PowerDMS, as were patrols’ written directives.”

Stephanie Erb

Meet Jason, the Administration Sergeant for the Arvada Police Department in Colorado. Maybe you can learn from his experience with training during this pandemic.

“We have published CDC-recommended training videos to our employees through PowerDMS. We also postponed in-service training and tasked instructors with filming a session that can be published online, for those who haven’t completed the training.”

Jason Ammon

Customers like Marci and Stephanie have learned firsthand how effective online training can be. PowerDMS lets you customize digital curriculums, create quizzes to test comprehension, and manage training from one, convenient source. Which means your staff can complete training on their own schedule, on any device. Interested in learning more?

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3. Approval Workflows

Ed is the Accreditation Manager for Buckeye Police Department near Phoenix, AZ. He has been using PowerDMS to manage workflows, as well as distributing policies with minimal contact.

“The use of document workflows reduces the need for group discussion. PowerDMS also provides a platform for pushing critical data to stakeholders while reducing direct contact…we have pushed out the CDC COVID-19 updates and any related documents that we want the ability to track. This includes, but is not limited to, changes in procedures and special orders.”

Ed Goodman

Meet Erin, the Policy Analyst for Lethbridge Police Service in Alberta, Canada. Learn how her team has leveraged policy software during the pandemic.

“We’re using PowerDMS workflows and discussion comments instead of holding face to face meetings…we also used it to share our Pandemic Contingency Plan with all of our staff.”

Erin Lix

Customers like Ed and Erin learned the benefits of approval workflows firsthand. With PowerDMS, automated alerts notify employees about coming audits, annual reviews, policy updates, and more. Sometimes policies require review from multiple people before being approved. Made with collaboration in mind, you can automate the review and approval process with approval workflows. Interested in learning more?

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4. Remote Access

Kathy is the Accreditation Manager for Cobb County 911 in Georgia. Learn how she’s been able to stay productive remotely.

“Since I am now having to telework, I was able to upload and update some revised policies from home. I am able to do most of my work via PowerDMS. For example, we uploaded a countywide specific policy regarding Limited Operations for COVID-19 response.”

Kathy Strickland

Kathy leveraged PowerDMS as a central repository for their most important documents. You can too. By creating a single source of truth with powerful search capabilities, you can always find what you need, when you need it, wherever you are. With the mobile app, crucial documents are at your fingertips. Get real-time notifications, search for policies online, and E-sign time-sensitive documents. All from your phone. Interested in learning more?

How is Your Organization Responding to the Coronavirus?

These are just a few examples of how customers have used PowerDMS to distribute new policies and procedures, automate workflows, communicate effectively, and keep their staff healthy and safe.

How has your organization responded to this crisis? Do you need a way to create, distribute, and track policies and training, like many of our customers?

In times of crisis, effective risk management tools can get your organization through to the other side. We will come out of this, but only together.

How can we help your organization?

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