1. Create Buy In: Get Things Done CalACT Conference November 3, 2017
Good morning, my name is Katie Gagnon, I am the Grants and Budget manager at Foothill Transit. I recently moved into this position and prior to that I was the Special Projects Manager where I implemented many different types of projects throughout the agency and had many opportunities to deal with people who didn’t want to change things because that is the way it has always been done. Today I am going to run through a few of my experiences and what I learned from them as well as somethings I learned recently in grad school when I received my masters in leadership and management.
Create Buy In:
Get Things Done
CalACT Conference
November 3, 2017

2. Foothill Transit Area Served Buses Agency Ridership 2 Operations Yards
Fast Facts
Area Served
Buses
327 square miles of the San Gabriel and Pomona Valleys
360
(15 electric and 345 CNG)
Agency Ridership
2 Operations Yards
~ 14 million a year
I wanted to first provide a couple details about Foothill Transit. Our fleet is completely alternative fuel, we have 360 buses and 15 of those are all electric vehicles). We have 2 operations yards that are both run by contractors. We run 34 local and express routes. We serve an area of 327 sq miles that spans the San Gabriel Valley in East Los Angeles county. We have approximately 14 million boardings a year and an annual budget of $160 million.
Both yards have operations contractors providing services
Annual Budget
$160 Million
Routes
34 local and express routes

3. Discussion Today Presentation Outline Background Outline of Projects
Lessons and Solutions
Conclusion
Questions?
Today I am going to give you a bit of background and outline of specific projects I have worked on followed by lessons I learned and solutions. And wrap up with a conclusion and I think questions will be at the end of all our presentations.

4. Foothill Transit Projects
Class Pass – External Relations
Technology Implementation – Administrative Project
First I am going to run through two different types of projects I worked on and a few details and difficulties I faced with each. After that I will get to what I found as a good solution.
The projects I am going to outline are all different in that I was dealing with different groups of people who had a reason not to want these projects. One thing to note, while implementing all these projects I had no direct reports and so all the consensus building I had to do was not through having power over them but instead I had to figure out other ways to get what I wanted.
How to implement these programs without being a supervisor?

5. Class Pass Program and Implementation Student Rider Program
Discounted rate for students of local colleges and universities
Student Rider Program
Public agencies who may have limited staff and time to implement a program that requires man hours on campus
Everyone is Spread Thin
Not all schools see the benefit of this type of program for their students.
Approval from School Administration
This is ideal but not always available.
Support from the Top
The first project is the Class Pass, Foothill Transit’s student rider program. When I came on board I was to create and launch this program and partner with local universities. In order to do this I had to get the schools administrative team on board.
A few difficulties I faced with this dynamic was that not everyone saw the benefit of this program for students and everyone that would have to help with this was spread thin. most of the schools I deal with are public colleges and everyone has multiple jobs to do and here I am asking them to do more. It was also difficult to move the project forward without high level support from the school administrators.

6. Technology Implementation
Facing push back because of lack of understanding or unwillingness to learn something new
LaserFiche
Electronic file storage. Most people are uncomfortable getting rid of paper trail.
Employee Portal
The other type of projects I wanted to discuss were internal projects that I worked on with the entire administrative staff to implement. There were two IT projects that I implemented, one was paperless paycheck stubs and launching an employee portal. I also began implementation of electronic document storage and enforcing a document retention policy. Some push back I got was people not comfortable with not having a physical printed document, whether it was their paycheck or all their paper files I was trying to have them store electronically. Staff was not only untrusting of electronic storage but they also weren’t comfortable with the programs and how to access what they needed.
Paper paychecks. Find their own documents.

7. Why people don’t do something we ask of them
No one likes being told what to do
People usually like knowing why
People are comfortable with status quo
People like knowing how
Most people don’t like being told what to do, I know I don’t like to. People are much more willing to do something if they believe in the benefit to them.
This works a lot better for success in a project than telling someone that they have to do something. The other thing that people like to know is how, training is important in anything that changes, if people feel comfortable with the way to do something they are more likely to use it more often. These are both ways to get someone to move away from the status quo, show them that the grass is greener on the other side.

8. Solution: Create Buy In
How to create value for your audience so they want to do something
Understand Audience
Training
Education
Understand your Audience
Ask yourself ahead of time:
What motivates them?
What questions will they have?
What concerns them about this?
Training
Ensure training provides:
Step by step directions
Clear guidance
Create training designed for everyone
I found that there were three main aspects to creating buy in in the projects I worked on.
You first want to understand the people that you are dealing with.
You want to ask yourself ahead of time:
What motivates them? When looking at my interactions with operations contractors they are going to have different goals than when I am talking to college . Knowing those differences will help me to formulate my plan of action.
What questions will they have? Try to predict what questions may come up ahead of time and answer them during discussions before they can ask them. It will hopefully make people more comfortable knowing that you are trying to see their concerns and address them before they have to voice them.
What concerns them about this? Trying to be proactive and figure out the top concerns of your audience will help you shape your program to address those. Knowing the concerns isn’t going to get you anywhere though you need to respond to them and address them. Through education.
Education is the next step to getting buy in. I think of this as the sales pitch part of this. Once I have the program laid out it is time for me to tell the team how wonderful it is and what great things it is going to do. I want to make sure not to over promise but give them the basics of how this will help them and the agency.
The last step is the training. This will probably take the most planning. I like to make sure that I am going to address everything I learned from the team about their concerns and potential questions that may come up.
- Not only that but I want to be able to provide materials that they can take with them or an SOP that they can reference if they have questions in the future. Training is important but it is also important to provide reference materials for the future. Make it clear and assume that you are giving this to the least capable person. If you are able to successfully guide that person through your process then everyone else will be able to follow.
Education
Provide information:
How this will benefit them
How it will make their life easier
How it will help the agency

9. Process Class Pass Program Admin. IT Projects Project Action Plans
Audience
College Administrative Staff
Foothill Transit Administrative Staff
Educate
Program will help students
Address concerns of work load
Outline fraud prevention
You don’t need to ask someone for a document
Saves time and remotely accessible
Sustainable
To show you how I used the three steps I outlined for buy in on my projects I have outlined them here.
First for the Class Pass program I knew my audience was the college administrative staff and that they were telling me they were overworked and had no more capacity and didn’t see the benefit of this type of program.
Educate- I first showed them how this program would benefit students and then outlined the process of issuing these passes and how we streamlined this process to make it easier for them to distribute. I also added in another benefit of how we designed this to reduce the amount of fraud which was a benefit to the school.
Training- I provided step by step printed guides to staff as well as a FAQ document that would have answers to the most commonly asked questions they may be faced with. I also was there in person for the initial program launch to provide support to the staff as well as assist in those questions students had.
IT Projects
Audience – foothill transit staff, some of who had been in their jobs for 20+ years and comfortable with the status quo
Educate – Showed staff they would have a ton of documents at the tip of their fingers with both the employee portal and the electronic document storage. Most of this information would save them time and would be accessible on their phones. Foothill Transit really focuses on sustainability and I pointed out the benefit to the environment.
Training- I gave all staff hands on – small group training in front of computers for the portal launch. I also provided them with printed directions on how to access everything. And some employees needed more training so I worked with them one on one until they became comfortable.
Train
Step by step directions
Separate FAQ document
In person support
Small group hands on training
Step by step printed directions
One on one training as needed

10. Conclusion Create Buy In to Win!
Place your Subtitle Here
People don’t like being told what to do
Conclusion
People are more likely to do something if they believe it will do good
Steps to get them onboard:
Know your audience
Educate/Sell it
Train

11. Budget and Grants Manager, Foothill Transit
Thank you!
Katie Gagnon, MSLM
Budget and Grants Manager, Foothill Transit