Laban, A. P., III. (2015). Customer-focused service: DepEd, Division of Baguio City (Unpublished master's thesis). Public Management Development Program, Development Academy of the Philippines.

Public Management Development Program Middle Managers Class Batch 4 Thesis (MMC)--Development Academy of the Philippines.

The DepEd - Division of Baguio City is the second largest division in the Cordillera Administrative Region with over 2,000 public school teachers and nonteaching personnel catering to over 58,000 learners in public elementary and secondary schools. The division is also supervising a growing number of private schools, now 146 and still counting, who are catering to more than 28,000 learners. The Division Office of DepED Baguio City has 67 employees and staff members including the private schools. But despite the big number of internal and external customer, the Division Office's front line services are still paper-based or manual operations. Apart from having paper-based and manual operations, there are no institutionalized workflows being followed in the Division Office's front line services. These combined challenges, if not improved, cause low productivity and efficiency amongst the employees and the Division Office as a whole. With low productivity and with the unchecked possibilities of delay in the delivery of the services, the Division Office's internal and external customers may not be served well. In response to the above-cited challenges, this Re-entry Project was purposely conceptualized to address them. This ReP is designed to start up the computerization efforts of the Division in order to facilitate the use of technology in the way the efforts of the Division in order to facilitate the use of technology in the way the employees deliver services. In this way, hopefully, the employees would be able to work with ease, to be guided with clearer work processes, and eventually, increase their productivity. To be more successfully in the integration of technology in the front line services, a series of discussions on how to infuse changes in the office were held, led by the scholar-proponent, backed by the ReP Team members and supported by the Institutional Partner (IP). After which, a training cum seminar-workshop was conducted for the division office employees and the non-teaching from the three main public secondary schools in Baguio City. This activity gave the scholar and the ReP team the opportunity to advocate the plans laid out for the Re-entry Project. This training may have also facilitated employees' understanding on the need for some interventions that are necessary to address some challenges faced by the non-teaching personnel at the Division Office. This activity also helped in the eventual acceptability of the ReP especially during the implementation period. The implementation period produced four major outputs: (1) Networked office computers, (2) Users' training on the Document Tracking System (DoTS), (3) Fully functional DoTS for at least two (2) front line services, and (4) Revised DepEd Division of Baguio City's Citizen's Charter. The networking of office computers is to enable personnel to share data readily. The networking is also necessary for the installation of the DoTS. Users' training was conducted for the employees to be taught on the proper use of the DoTS. Considering that the DoTS is something new as far as the division office employees are concerned, user's training is necessary. The most important output for this this ReP is the Document Tracking System. With a very limited time for ReP implementation, it was also the most demanding . The DoTS is computer program that tracks down the status of every document submitted to the division office. The main purpose of the DoTS is to guide the teachers, employees and other customers on the status of their documents. The DoTS also aims to check and monitor employee performance for the purpose of solving delays in work processes. By eliminating delay, the amount of time within which a teacher or a schools employees transacts with the Division Office will be substantially reduced. Eventually, by cutting their time away from their respective schools, the teachers and employees will have more opportunity to serve our school children. Lastly, the revision of the division office's Citizen's Charter is necessary for the employees to have a clear knowledge of their functions and office procedures. The old Citizen's Charter was revised for it to be responsive to the needs of the division office's customer like providing them with all the necessary information for very frontline service in the Division Office. The Citizen's Charter was tied up with the DoTS in monitoring the time that should be allotted in processing a certain document. Aside from the above outputs, another important facet drawn out through this ReP is on human relations. This ReP brought different personalities-internal and external, top to bottom, to work together on something noble. It has brought about the realization of a very important practice in a successful organization - teamwork. Teamwork was exemplified by the ReP Team members and other employees of DepEd-Division of Baguio City in the implementation of this ReP. Finally, all things considered, this Re-entry project was conceptualized, implemented, and hopefully will be sustained in harmony with the goal of the Division Office to improve itself to better serve its customer and stakeholders.