Organizational Development for Knowledge Management at Water ...

When the document is submitted for signatures, Continuous Improvement will review the document for
format and consistency. The Process Owner may be contacted for clarification or changes that need to be
made. This may delay the approval process depending on the amount of work required to bring the
document to acceptable standards. When the document review is complete, Continuous Improvement will
send the document to the Approvers for signature.
An e-mail message is automatically sent to the Document Approvers who then have 30 calendar days to
respond. Upon receiving the e-mail message indicating that a document is ready for approval, the
Approver clicks the Document Link icon in the mail message to access the document. To approve the
document the Approver clicks on the “Sign Document” button. The database records the Approver’s name
and the date of the signature.
If an Approver does not respond within the 30-day period, Continuous Improvement may contact the
Process Owner and/or outstanding Approver(s) to decide how to proceed. The system does not
automatically default an Approver’s signature. After all signatures have been obtained, an e-mail is sent to
the Process Owner and Continuous Improvement.
The Process Owner incorporates changes as deemed appropriate. If the Process Owner does not agree with
the change recommendations, he/she explains to the person recommending the changes the reasons why
they are not feasible. It is the Process Owner’s responsibility to accept or reject tracked changes and then
notify Continuous Improvement that the document is ready to be moved. Once the CI Department receives
this communication from the Process Owner, the document is issued to the Approved Process Documents
Database.
1.11. Issuing Documents
Once the document has been approved, the Continuous Improvement Department moves the document to
the Approved Process Documents Database and stamps each page of the document with an “APPROVED”
watermark. Attachments that meet the criteria for Process Tools will be placed in the Process Tools
Database.
The Approved Process Documents Database is accessible by all Colorado Springs Utilities employees
through their Lotus Notes account and is “read only”. If you do not have access to Lotus Notes or the QBD
Process Documents Databases, call the URC at 8-4357.
1.12. Notification
When a document is issued an e-mail notification is sent to the Process Owner, all Approvers, and all
persons/groups listed in the notification field. It is the responsibility of the Process Owner and/or
appropriate management to ensure all stakeholders and users are aware of the new approved process
document.
Additional notification is available in QBD Activity reports. These reports list all the documents that have
been approved and issued or made obsolete.
1.13. Using Documents
Any Colorado Springs Utilities employee can view documents residing in the Approved Process
Documents Database. There are a select few documents that have been marked as “Private” and cannot be
universally viewed. If you have documents of this nature, contact Continuous Improvement to mark them
as such.
Work is performed in the manner and order documented. If any employee identifies an opportunity to
improve a process, they should contact the Process Owner and follow the change process in Section 6.8.
There is also a button at the top of each approved document binder labeled “Process Improvement Opp.”.
By selecting this button, an e-mail is automatically created addressed to the Process Owner. Any employee
may use this functionality to send suggestions for process improvements to the Process Owner.
The process for searching the Approved Process Documents Database to find the appropriate document is
detailed in attachment I02-00002 Search Instructions.
Use of electronic copies is encouraged, but not always feasible. Making paper copies for use in such
situations is allowed, but the Master Document List should be checked frequently to assure that version
changes have not occurred, making the paper copies obsolete. For attachments, such as forms, version
changes are identified in the footer by month/year. When a version changes, all paper copies of the prior
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