As we welcome a new year, we wanted to take a moment to reflect on some recent accomplishments from our FAS Business Services departments, as well share out some exciting projects and goals we’re looking forward to implementing in the year to come.
Ch-ch-changes! Business and Financial Services (BFS) recently completed its budget process redesign effort, which was approved by FAS leadership. BFS is beyond excited to kick off the upcoming budget season with the new process in place.
In the new year, BFS is exploring innovative ways to enhance recruiting and retention efforts – including the development of a career map, which will outline career paths for team members. They plan to roll out this feature this year, along with other exciting programs that are beginning to take shape. Big things are ahead for BFS!
FAS Human Resources Support Services (HRSS) has risen to the challenge of continuous improvement this past year. Highlights include hiring process improvements and updates to how exit interviews are handled – not to mention HRSS’s close work with FAS's Binta Brown in supporting our units in the area of retention and looking at the entire employee life cycle to make it more equitable.
Looking ahead, the FAS HRSS team is building a knowledge base for self-service functionality and integrating approvals with DocuSign. They hope to implement many of the recommendations from last year’s hiring process improvement work, so stay tuned.
And let’s not forget the HRSS Service Portal in Service Now! Last year, HRSS and Technology Resources (TRecs) teamed up with ITS to launch the portal, which is now used FAS-wide to streamline requests and provide valuable metrics on workloads and service time. And get ready for Phase 2 updates, which look to bring new service request types – including translation and background checks – to the portal.
TRecs also just went live with a brand-new interactive UT Austin map – check out the updated version here. They worked with multiple stakeholders across campus to gather feedback and address concerns – talk about innovation and teamwork in action!
What’s next for TRecs? They’re working with Information Technology Services, better known to some as ITS, and campus stakeholders on a Next Generation Platform project that will replace the Pype platform, and they’re also hard at work implementing OneDrive as the default cloud storage and backup.
There’s no doubt about it – that’s a lot to celebrate! We look forward to seeing these FBS initiatives in action in 2022 – and we’ll be shining a spotlight every step of the way.
Taylor Grobelny