[0:01] Matty: So panel two is focussing on the operational excellence. So I'm joined by three lovely people if you guys want to introduce yourselves. Just working down from Rebecca.
[0:09] Rebecca (Macular Disease Foundation): Rebecca Sobczak. I'm the general manager for programmes and operations at Macular Disease Foundation. We work with the macular disease community to help reduce the impact of the disease on that community. And we do that through our support and services, the advocacy that we do with government and through our research which we fund other researchers as well as conducting our own research.
[0:34] Lisa (Wildlife Victoria CEO): Hi everyone. I'm Lisa Palmer, the CEO of Wildlife Victoria. Wildlife Victoria is a not-for-profit that provides a statewide wildlife emergency response service for sick, injured and orphaned wildlife. Last year we handled over 160,000 calls for help. We attended to nearly 98,000 native species across native animals across around 450 species. So we have an emergency response service, an infield veterinary team and around 1,200 rescue volunteers across the state.
[1:10] Matty: Impressive.
[1:13] Spencer (Able Foods CEO): My name's Spencer Ratliff. I'm CEO and co-founder of Able Foods. So we're a disability specialist ready-made meal provider. We offer a range of meals right through from our standard range to texture-modified meals for people with disability. So people with dysphagia and issues swallowing. We've got IDDSI-compliant level three and four meals currently delivering to about 4,500 postcodes right across Australia. And we've recently expanded into aged care through the home care packages and the soon-to-be support at home programme.
Defining operational excellence
[1:48] Matty: Very cool. Alrighty. So first question to kind of set the tone, how do you guys define operational excellence within your organisation?
[1:58] Rebecca: I think for me it's about using our donor dollars and our grant income in the most efficient way possible. But it's also how we do that without compromising quality. So I think when we talk about doing more with less, I was like, oh my God, is this the right question? When we think about that, it is about how can we be as efficient as possible without losing the quality of what we do. I think it's always about weighing up what we're investing in and thinking about then the cost of doing nothing. So while sometimes there's this mantra of, you know, we always want to do more with less, I think the other really important thing is sometimes it takes a little bit of investment up front to be able to do that. And we can't shy away from needing to think about how we can do that in order to do more.
[3:00] Lisa: So excellent question for us because we are an operations function, we're out in field non-stop. So for us, every second counts. If we miss a call, an animal could die, an animal could be suffering much, much longer than it needs to. So we are, in effect, almost like the Triple O for the State of Victoria for Wildlife. So for us, operational excellence is a mindset. It permeates absolutely everything we do, but it's driven by passion.
So coming into our emergency response service, it looks like you'd see, or what you'd imagine, a lot of emergency response services alike. We've got operators with phones, multiple screens, big screens, map of the state. There's a lot going on, but we deeply care and we all know that answering that phone is critical to getting help for the wildlife. So our staffing model's a little different from what you'd expect in a normal call centre. Most of our staff have degrees in wildlife, conservation, ecology, zoology, plus customer service experience. So there's that deep passion and care.
We're also a charity and we're struggling, so we're seeing a 20% year-on-year demand in growth for our service and that equals rising operating costs. So operational excellence is about everything from the front to the end. It is about ensuring consistency in how we do things. It's ensuring efficiency, it's ensuring we can capture all the information we need, it's ensuring our technology is integrated, it's ensuring that we are constantly embedding or we constantly have a continuous improvement mindset. It's super, super, super, super hectic. And in our busiest days, we're dealing with over 1000 calls a day and well into the night. So we're 24-7, but it's... I could talk for hours on this topic, but it is absolutely permeating every fibre of our being at Wildlife Victoria.
[5:11] Matty: Very much at the core. Spencer?
[5:13] Spencer: Yeah, I think for us being able to do more with less, there's probably a couple of areas that we focus on. I think that when you have to operate in an environment where you're resource-constrained, getting the right people in your organisation is paramount. And so being really, really clear on the type of people that you want within your organisation. And I think it goes back to getting people that are passionate about the cause and truly believe in it, because I think that that's the only way you can do more with less people is you've got the right people.
And then I think as well, being really, really clear and defining what people's roles and responsibilities are so that everybody knows what it is that they're there to do. And how does that ladder up to the overall purpose of the organisation is so important. And then lastly, ruthless prioritisation when you don't have the resources, you don't have the luxuries of some of these bigger organisations. You just have to be really ruthless about where you're spending your time and what you're attending to.
There's also a balance that you need to strike as well, because it can't all be attacking the big meaty projects. You need to be able to find space for people to do the things that they're passionate about and the professional development and stuff like that. But that all comes through with making sure that you're really managing your people well.
[6:29] Matty: Nice. Yeah, I'm trying to find that balance.
Balancing tech investment vs existing programmes
[6:32] Matty: And speaking of balance, a bit of a tech question for you guys. How do you balance investing in new operational systems versus maintaining existing programmes when budgets are tight? So where do you kind of look at your martech and kind of where do you have to pull in looking?
[6:45] Lisa: Well, you can't. So you can't invest millions of dollars in tech when you're an NFP. You can if you're lucky and if there's anyone watching out there or listening here and you can, I'm very envious. But it's about doing what you can with what you have, but it's also about how you work. So we have a whole bunch of acronyms, everyone knows what they are. It means that instead of typing a sentence, you can type in something like MOP, which means member of public HBC Hit by car. So it goes on and on.
And we invest significantly in training up front. So prior to any of our staff going out in field or getting on the phones, we're investing, investing, investing in training so that once people are on the job, they are extremely efficient at that job. And measurement. So we measure absolutely everything. But you can get a lot out of your existing technology if you understand it and you can do some configuration yourself without breaking it.
So the type of tech that we use is important. It's going to be agile, it's going to be able to be continuously improved, it's going to be configurable and our tech is highly integrated because we can't afford to be running across three systems, entering data in one, re-entering it into another and re-entering it into another. But it comes down to ROI. If we need to invest in technology and it's going to enable us to pick the calls up faster, to have fewer people on the phones, attend to more wildlife, we'll do it because we deeply understand our operating costs, our Staff costs, costs of veterinary medicines and all sorts of things.
[8:49] Spencer: I would say don't chase perfection. You know, what is the minimal viable product, what is the low-hanging fruit that you can address? And not everything has to be part of this big solve-everything project. There are opportunities to do things quickly. What are the quick wins? I think if you're continually putting something off for this big tech project that you have planned in two years' time or whatever it is, then that just becomes too big of a project. And I think you're not being afraid to act quickly on things along the way, I think is probably the way to go. And as I said, identify what is that low-hanging fruit and what is the risk-reward and what is that return on investment? Exactly right.
[9:36] Rebecca: I think we would approach it with a blend of those two things. So when I think about balancing, I think it is really important to be thinking about the future state that you want while you're also keeping the fires going on your existing programmes and projects. But I think having that end goal in mind is critical. So I think one of the things that we've did really well was we looked at a roadmap of here was where our strategy was taking us and what did we need to be able to achieve that. And we could see that our current systems weren't really doing that.
So we had a series of projects that have rolled out over three years now, probably a little bit longer and in odds. And you're right, I think it's not about trying to tackle it all at once. I think we would never have achieved it. What we did was we have done them iteratively and it also helped us to learn along the way. So we probably have taken different tactics because we did that slow approach. So it meant that we could assess what we brought in and then we probably made some different decisions according to how that was working and maybe reprioritise.
So I think that iteration and trying not to bite everything off and I think also that point around making sure that every single one of your systems is working as effectively as possible, you're getting the most out of it. Otherwise it feels like I was thinking about it today in one of our meetings. It feels like you're building a tree house and all you're doing is just nailing or bolting on the next thing as opposed to thinking about the future and thinking, well, we've got this tree house. Is it just that, you know, we need to remove something here or think about it in a different way? So I think it is that blend of all of those things, that's really important.
Managing volunteers at scale
[11:25] Matty: Yeah, 100%. Alrighty, moving on to volunteers. So volunteers are critical, but hard to manage at scale. What's working for you in terms of recruiting, training and retaining volunteers efficiently? Who wants to go first?
[11:40] Matty: I will, because your volumes are.
[11:43] Lisa: And look, our volunteers are operational volunteers, so if they need to attend to an injured animal at 2:30am and save its life, that is a deployment, it's a job. But people are volunteers, so we can't force them to go. So what we found at Wildlife Victoria is people have the perception that wildlife volunteering is bottle-feeding cute baby joeys, when in fact, 90% of what you're dealing with is significant injury, trauma and euthanasia.
So I'd observed Wildlife Victoria over its history, recruiting each year probably four to 500 new volunteers, and then the next year doing it again and the next year doing it again and the next year doing it again. So, of course, with volunteer efficiency, it starts at the front. So now we conduct information sessions and we'll get rooms of 300 people at those information sessions. And usually half of the room leaves in the break because we're very, very clear about what it is, what it involves, the physical safety aspects, the mental health triggers.
We have existing volunteers talk about their experience and usually you find half of the room feel incredibly inspired and the other half leave. And that's fantastic. That's perfectly fine. We've also started screening our volunteers for both physical and mental safety and fit for the role. And we also impose minimum requirements because we have to. 20% year-on-year increase in injured wildlife means we need more people, so people understand that they know very much what they're coming into. And we also use tech.
So our volunteers for years have been dispatched to wildlife rescue jobs through a portal that is interfaced and linked in with our tech platform. So there's a lot around tech, around efficiency with volunteers using technology, but people are people and people need to actually use the technology. It's going to be user-friendly. But volunteers understanding what the volunteering role is is deeply important.
[14:29] Rebecca: So we have grown our volunteers nowhere near that. So I feel like we're just this tiny little thing. But I think it's been a really important part of our scale nationally. So we're only 22 people here in Sydney. We do service all of Australia and our volunteers have allowed us to start to have presence in other states and communities, so that's been really important for us.
They are all managed centrally, so we do have a volunteer manager who does all of that. And I think that's been a really important thing for us to have someone who understands the motivations and the passions of people who are volunteering. So, you know, our volunteers are not at the front line of wildlife management. They're more likely to be at the front line of, you know, hard experiences for people experiencing macular disease in the community. But they could also be doing community education. They could also be. We still have some envelope stuffers. I'm sure all charities do have that as well.
And so I agree, I think it is about the retention. So we can invest a lot of money and effort up front in attracting those volunteers and onboarding them. But I think it's actually retention. So I think we're not, we're doing well enough in the record management part. I think that when we brought in our CRM Salesforce, that's really helped with that. But I think we've got more to do in terms of how we communicate, retain, manage compliance requirements. And I think that for us is that next stage on the roadmap.
[16:02] Lisa: If I could just touch on that point, and that's a really important one. So many, many, many not-for-profit organisations, as we all know, are powered by passionate volunteers and we couldn't do without them. But that passion is also, it also poses a human resources challenge. So one of the things I reflected on moving from the for-profit sector for 30 years into the NFP sector is you can't incent a volunteer based on an annual performance bonus.
So for us it's around and we don't always get it right. And it's a persistent challenge, but it's explaining to volunteers in a way they understand why we have processes. So, you know, in our case, the closest available volunteer, even if six volunteers are available to rescue a koala joey, the closest volunteer will get the job. Closest trained expert volunteer. Why? Because that animal is going to have an improved welfare outcome. So explaining it in operational efficiency or operations in ways that connect to that passion is really important.
Data management with lean teams
[17:19] Matty: Cool. Moving on to everyone's favourite chat around data or data, depending where you're from. So how do you guys approach capturing data, data management when you have a lean team, like Spencer was saying, and all the luxury of the big organisations, that it's someone's complete role or you have an entire team that does data management too, how do you guys approach data within your orgs?
[17:39] Rebecca: I love this question and this is probably the one I could talk about for ages. I don't necessarily think we do it well, I think as an organisation we're pretty early on our journey, but what I would love to share are some of our learnings and maybe other people can do this a little bit faster if they learn some of the things that we've come up against.
Knowing your end goal, and I know that that's come up a couple of times already today, knowing what you want to capture and what constitutes success for your organisation is critical because you can have the best data and the cleanest data in the world, but if you don't know what you want to report on, it kind of doesn't matter. And I think understanding what you want at the end is really going to guide are you capturing the right data and at the right data points. So I think that's probably my first tip. Have your end goal in mind.
The second is that, you know, lots of for-purpose organisations don't have data teams. Lots of the small purpose-driven organisations don't. But in some ways I think the risk is if you have a team or a person, you suddenly begin to think that it's their responsibility as opposed to, I think data is everyone's responsibility and I think the ability to use it and manage it and find meaning in it should be a core skill that we're looking for in all of our new employees. And if they don't have it in our existing employees, then we should be thinking about how we develop that.
So I think the risk, you know, what I would love to see is that we all think about data as something that we want to be involved in, that we are looking for those skills. I think the third thing is that without building that capability as an entire organisation, as opposed to thinking about it as one person's responsibility, if we don't build that, then you can't know when it's wrong. So I think even a data team can produce a report, but if we don't have the ability to interrogate that or understand whether or not it's hitting the mark, then I think we're doing our organisations a disservice. So I think they're probably my three top tips.
[19:52] Spencer: Probably a couple of things. I think that you need to get buy-in on the value of data from your team. So there's a couple of ways you can do that. I think you can simplify. Data doesn't have to be scary. There's a lot of great dashboards that you can use, whether that's data within your CRM or whether it's your marketing team and things like that. So trying to simplify data so it doesn't feel big, scary and too complicated is probably one thing. I think using data to celebrate the wins as well as the opportunities is really, really important as well.
And then lastly, I would say that you have to lead by example. And so using data and showing data in your decisions as leaders of the business is a way that you can get the rest of the business to see the value in it. And we've spoken about this. I think I had a little phrase that I use here. You don't need a data team, you need a team that values data.
[20:48] Matty: Write that down. Write that down.
[20:53] Lisa: So, at Wildlife Victoria, data drives everything we do. We don't have a data issue, but. So I'll probably focus less on how we use data because it's so embedded into what we do. Imagine sending an ambulance to the wrong address if someone's having a heart attack. So we have to use data, but I'll flip it a little and talk about impact.
So Wildlife Victoria's data is actually one of our biggest organisational assets and we use it to drive our advocacy goals. We use it to engage with media and regularly. It is newsworthy when we've had a 480% increase in poisoning of kangaroos with a particular grass type. It is newsworthy when we've had an increase in wildlife road trauma. But why do we care that it's newsworthy? Because that's how we change legislation, that's how we drive improved outcomes for our wildlife. And without that data, we would have no credibility.
So I would love to see many, many more not-for-profit organisations realise that their data is one of their most valuable assets in driving the change and the organisational purpose forward. And we're at the point our data is so valuable the government will pay us for it.
[22:22] Rebecca: Yeah, well, that's great.
[22:24] Spencer: It's really interesting that, because I think that in the for-purpose or the not-for-profit space, talking about the good that you do is not enough and it needs to be backed in data. I think talk is pretty cheap in that space because everyone's saying the same thing. We're great. Look at all these amazing things that we're doing. But the cut-through that you get in particular with government certainly comes from that data.
[22:46] Matty: Yeah. I can agree as a marketer that stats and numbers and figures, data speak volumes more than just like, we're doing good. So, yeah, last question for you guys. What's one operational tactic that's made the biggest difference in your ability to scale Impact without scaling budget.
Scaling impact without scaling budget
[23:04] Lisa: I'll probably repeat what I've already said before. It's actually the investment in the human resources up front because that's driven significant data quality, improved operating outcomes because we can't afford rework. But for us it's been, we've completely, and we're continuously doing so, changing our onboarding programme each year we're making tweaks, but it's just so much a part of our DNA that we're always looking for ways to do it better. But a non-operational thing is really investing in the human resources who are the ones dealing with the data every day.
[23:52] Rebecca: I'll pick up on the human resources that Lisa talked about because for us our human resources are almost all of our operating costs. So as a service organisation, you know, it's the people who are servicing the macular disease community or who are helping us to raise the funds, which is where our biggest operational expense is. So for me, the approach I take is saving our people for the jobs that only a person can do. So when we're talking about something like a helpline team, it's, you know, we're working with the demographic and I think Betty talked about this as well. They want to talk to a real human. We're not quite there yet. So whether that, you know, will change in 10 years' time, who knows. But it's how do we make their jobs as least manual or as least administratively burdensome so that they can focus on having those, those calls, having those conversations. And we're trying to get technology to do everything else that it can, so removing as much of that manual workload as we can and saving our people for the jobs that we want people to do.
[24:59] Spencer: Yeah, I'd have to agree. It's where can you automate, where can you create efficiencies? And I think that sometimes teams can be scared of automation because they worry, well, does that mean that I'm going to lose my job or there's going to be job cuts? Because what I do and the work that I do can be automated. But I think that what we've tried to explain to our team is that we're trying to grow the business and so if we can do more with the team that we have today through efficiencies or finding areas where we can automate things, then it makes their job easier and it actually means we can maximise our output and the number of clients that we can reach, which ultimately means that we're further driving our purpose of serving as many people as possible and helping as many of those underrepresented people receive meals. And Pendula's been really helpful in that, by the way. And I can talk a little bit about what we've done there.
One of the things, and coming back to the data piece being really important, is in particular our ability to advocate for our clients and into government. Because in the space we operate in, in the NDIS and home care packages, we're always at risk of there being a policy change or a funding change. And then all of a sudden our clients' ability to access meals becomes harder. And so what we did is developed what we call a health outcomes collection. So when we onboard new clients as part of the onboarding process, we collect what their goals are, their health goals, what is their understanding of nutrition and wellbeing. And then we track that over time. And so what it enables us to do is actually to tangibly show our clients the impact that we are giving them. But then also we can use that data to then show the impact that our service provides, which really helps with things like advocacy. And that's all through Pendula's automated two-way communications.
[26:57] Matty: Non-paid sponsorship there. Beautiful. Thank you guys. So we'll jump into the Q and A section here. So same as last time, for those on the live stream, you can use the Q and A section there. If you guys are dropping questions for those in the audience, you can just put your hands up and I'll run over to you. So any questions for the panel?
[27:17] Matty: Don't all rush at once. There we go. There we go.
Q&A Session
[27:24] Audience Member: Hi. You guys all talked about having a team that finds data important. What have you found to be the most helpful tools to actually get those people on board? You know, individuals are like, oh, whoops, I just made a typo. But you know, is it training? Is it things like that?
[27:44] Lisa: Well, I'm a little bit cheeky on that. So all of our new emergency response operators as part of their onboarding. Have to come out in field with me and pretend we're volunteers. So I am the CEO, but I've been a rescue volunteer and a carer for many, many years. And we experience the service that our team are providing as volunteers. And that is incredibly impactful for the team on the phones because they understand if a volunteer has said yes to a case and they might be pulled over on a busy freeway needing to know am I driving home or am I going another two suburbs out to rescue this animal? And they're left waiting for 10 minutes while we attach them to the case, how that feels.
So it's experiential communications is critically important in explaining to people why we have rules around data and the impact of not following those rules. And, you know, people don't like rules, people don't like change. Volunteers are much harder to influence than staff. But again, it goes back to what I said before, I think, which is having people experience the impact of poor data or understand the impact of poor data in a way that really resonates with them.
[29:19] Spencer: Yeah, I think that it's understanding the importance of data comes from not making decisions that aren't backed by data. And then your team eventually starts to realise that unless they come with data or they've got the data to back up a problem that they have. In our industry, we were constantly collecting or hearing client feedback. Now if we jumped at every piece of anecdotal feedback to solve a problem, you know, we'd be in trouble. And so sometimes it's, you know, you might have spoken to a client on the phone who had a view on how crunchy a chip is. Now, if we go and change the potato in our chips just because one client had an opinion on that, we'd be forever making updates. So it's actually saying to the team, have a look. All of that data is housed in our CRM. It's really easy to access and if you come back and the data validates what we're saying, then we'll make a decision on it. But it's making sure that you really stick to the rule of not making decisions that aren't backed by data.
[30:18] Rebecca: I really like that. And I think the other thing is to reflect it back. So I think that when we've introduced dashboards notwithstanding, people can get a little bit crazy and want to see everything on a dashboard. And Ramtin is probably grimacing at some of the conversations we had during implementation. But I think being able to show people what they've done. So whether that's measuring the success of a campaign or understanding how many outstanding calls have not been responded to in terms of the case management, I think that. Or, you know, or where people are at or what's been escalated, I think that's also really powerful. So people can see that things aren't just going in, they're actually. There's a purpose to them and it can help them understand or manage their workload.
[31:07] Matty: Cool. Any other audience questions? There we go.
[31:13] Matty: Thank you.
[31:15] Audience Member: It's somehow we all come back to the basics. The Human touch the data, the value of the data and having the technology support our businesses. But sometimes we get so excited for the new, you know, shiny objects that, or buzzwords that come on board like AI. So my question is if you have have you, or are you interested or do you see any use of the current state where the AI, the development of AI is at the moment that you can implement in your businesses that would support your businesses better in some way. And what that is.
[32:02] Matty: There's the AI question.
[32:03] Lisa: Yes, yes, yes and yes. So I think we're probably annoying to software providers at Wildlife Victoria because we're absolutely laser sharp, not interested. Oh yes, this could add value. But AI for us, I can think of a number of uses for it. I'm not at all interested in replacing my staff with AI chatbots because in an emergency the public want to speak to a human. And in our world each case is completely complex and unique and multi-layered.
But we have a persistent problem, for example, with members of public misidentifying species. And that's okay because we have so many of them and a species identification and the age of that animal and how it's behaving will drive the operational response. So AI detection of a species type would enable us to triage the case in a blink. We'd still triage it, but we wouldn't be spending 10 minutes speaking to, for example an elderly member of public about a brown bird and trying to ascertain what sort of animal it is. So I can see a lot of use for AI in operations, but you've got to be, I think, careful about where you do it and accuracy is the key thing for us as well.
[33:32] Rebecca: I'd probably jump in. Yeah, I absolutely agree and I think I jump in to say, I think we often jump to AI is replacing the human, whereas there are so many other use cases that it can be used for in lots of different ways along a journey. So I think Betty was talking about implementing the AI transcription, for example, so it's not replacing the human, but it makes the human a more efficient note-taker and actually improves record management. So I think it's about moving away from thinking of it as a single thing with a single purpose, which often we do conflate with is it replacing a human? But thinking about it more along the customer experience chain and where we can be leveraging that to improve the way that a human interacts with another human. So that's probably where I'd think about it.
[34:29] Spencer: Yeah, I think whether we like it or not, AI is here to stay. And our team's already using AI. I mean, we've got G Suite and now AI is integrated into the Office Suite, into gmail, into all of these things. And so the team are already using it. But what I would say is for organisations that are for-purpose or not-for-profit and resource-constrained, then there's a lot to be gained from the use of AI. And so whether that's in brainstorming sessions, whether that's refining ideas or organising something that you're putting together, whether it's in lieu of having HR or a lawyer on retainer, like, there are lots of ways that you can use AI. I think where there is a risk is that AI replaces people's ability to think critically. And so I think that AI is a tool, but you can't start with AI.
[35:30] Rebecca: Yeah, or I liked the example that I think we used earlier, which was you might start with a human and then end with a human. And I think we've just implemented an AI policy and that's absolutely where we've taken that. So everything. And it isn't that different between, you know, moving from a handwritten algorithm calculations to a calculator. You know, you still need to know whether or not the answer's right, so. Or if it's just boobs.
[36:01] Lisa: Look, I must say, I'm always bemused when I receive emails or papers or correspondence from somebody, whoever it may be, internal or external, because I'm pretty good at seeing when it's been written by ChatGPT. That doesn't look like your writing style. I don't think you've actually edited that report.
[36:21] Spencer: So a tip for everyone. It's the double hyphens, the dead giveaway, apparently. So watch out for it. Yeah, go on LinkedIn, there's double hyphens on every second post.
[36:30] Rebecca: I think it uses robust a lot. That's what I think.
[36:36] Spencer: The use of emojis.
[36:39] Matty: Very good. Any other questions, guys? Beautiful. All right, well, thank you guys so much. Give them a round of applause, guys. Thank you so much.
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