UW Connect helps departments/units provide consistent service to customers using standardized workflows for managing associated day-to-day work. It is the UW Academy-branded version of ServiceNow’s “Now” Platform. For UW Medicine employees, please contact UW Medicine IT Services to learn more about Unite (UW Medicine’s branded version of Service Now’s Platform).
When you use UW Connect, it’s easier to:
- Use one system for tracking service requests, issues and ensuing tasks rather than use shared email and tracking spreadsheets
- Transfer records/re-route them among different UW Academy units
- Capture customer requests more easily, including transitioning your primary intake channel from emails to request forms
- Deliver consistent and regular customer communication
- Better organize and prioritize work through repeatable processes and templates
- Access actionable data and reports
Recent Update
July 2023 saw two huge milestones for UW Connect!
UW Connect Finance
In conjunction with Finance Transformation, we launched UW Connect Finance. A critical piece of Workday’s Support Model, UW Connect provides capabilities such as Finance Case Management, finance intake forms, and customer-facing knowledge bases. Customers across the University (Academy side) who have questions related to Workday financial business processes can go to a single UW Connect landing page to get training and help documentation. They also have easy access to financial experts in their own Shared Environments for help and customer support.
UW Medicine IT Services is implementing their own instance of the ServiceNow platform, and have different intake mechanisms for Workday Finance questions and support. As this effort is still under way, UW Medicine Supply Chain is using UW Connect as a stop-gap measure until UW Medicine IT Services is ready to onboard this team to UW Medicine’s ServiceNow instance.
New License Model
We moved to an enterprise-wide ServiceNow ITSM license. Why is this so important? We previously had per-user licensing, necessitating a chargeback for our subscription customers. The chargeback was a barrier to entry for many who were otherwise interested in moving to the service management platform, and would have presented some challenges as we looked to roll out UW Connect Finance. Initially, the expansion of UW Connect across the enterprise has been focused on onboarding those who are part of the UWFT customer support model (40 organizations, which are a mixed of finance shared environments and central offices).
Features of UW Connect
Improved experienced for customers
Using a single case management system will provide high-quality, consistent customer service across the University.
- Dedicated Knowledge Base: A repository of articles that provide agents with information, such as self-help, troubleshooting and task resolution. Separate workflows can be used for publishing and retiring articles, and separate access controls can be used to control reading and contributing, such as if it’s for customers or for a service team, specifically.
- Intake forms and other intake channels: Custom-designed web-based forms guide customers through what they need for support, and when submitted, the form creates a record in the system. Some organizations also redirect existing support emails into UW Connect, which creates a record automatically – a good stopgap while structured intake forms are planned and built. It is also possible to generate records via integration, e.g., from IT monitoring tools.
- Request Management: Customer requests for a service: access to a service, a new item such as a phone, or for information about a service. Request Management is distinguished from Incident Management, which is focused on “break/fix” type issues.
- Incident Management: Tracks “break/fix” issues in order to restore normal service operation as quickly as possible, while minimizing operations impacts.
- My Requests: Customers access their new, in-progress, and closed records on the My Requests page, which lists the records created, along with each record’s Reference Number, unit providing help, issue description, last modified date and status.
Improved efficiency, workflow and customer support and service teams
- Routing: A streamlined workflow provides routing and re-routing, as needed, of customer records to a business function or queue owner.
- UW Connect support: Consulting with UW Connect’s service team can help you determine which services and assignment groups you’ll need. Training is provided, including help with UW Groups integration. UW Connect user group meetings offer community support, service updates and continual improvement.
- Record merge: When the same need for support is received multiple times, the records can be merged together.
- Metrics/performance analytics: Dashboards provide metrics about your services and response activity. The UW Connect Metrics and Reports team can provide support with creating reports.
- “Parent-child” record relationships/sub-tasks: A single record can be divided up into smaller tasks and assigned to different individuals and teams.
- Problem Management: Work done to address the root cause of one or more Incidents/potential Incidents, even after a workaround has been employed and the service has been restored in the short term.
- Change Management: A systematic approach to control the life cycle of changes minimize the disruption to the service.
Enterprise Service Desk
- UW-IT offers an additional for-fee Enterprise Service Desk option. This is a contact center for a single contact point for email, telephone calls, email routing, tier 1 resolution, 24x7x365 support, equipment/service monitoring, and metrics/analysis. If interested, please review the information about the Enterprise Service Desk in the UW-IT Service Catalog.