City: Racine, Wisconsin

Reporting to: City Clerk/Director of Dept. of Customer Service

The Challenge

The city of Racine is committed to servicing and providing opportunities for our residents, but we admit that we fall short despite our intentions. In response to resident complaints about poor customer service, the city launched the Department of Customer Service on January 1, 2024. This new department replaces four different previous customer counters and works with teams across the city to respond to resident needs promptly and efficiently. To support the work of this department, we invested in a new CRM (already in use) and a new website (due to launch in the summer of 2025) that helps to collect and store data, use AI where appropriate, and automate processes where possible.

Thus far, creating the Department of Customer Service was a huge leap in the right direction. We are improving at responding to resident needs and have logged more than 16k contacts and requests in our database since June 2024. We now want to ensure that we organize and use the data we are collecting to its full potential. We want the fellow to help us analyze the data, review existing data tags, and develop a coherent data structure that we can use going forward. This will guarantee that we use what we are learning from residents in our decisions about community outreach and policy. For example, we want to review our data to evaluate whether one demographic or neighborhood is overrepresented simply because they have submitted the most complaints or calls. The project would help us build trust in our community and raise awareness for city services. Due to the lack of innovative engagement, many of our residents may not be aware or trust that we can and will address their issues and provide services.

The mission statement of Racine is “priding ourselves in responding to the needs of our citizens by enhancing the quality of life and promoting economic growth.” In line with this mission, building trust and deepening relationships with our residents is a priority for Mayor Cory Mason. We believe excellent customer service is essential to building trust and improving residents’ quality of life. In parallel, city leadership seeks to build our data capabilities to make more data-driven decisions. Our city government participates in the Bloomberg Harvard City Leadership Initiative Data track with a focus on recruitment and retention of city staff, particularly to employ more Racine residents, which would help strengthen local relationships.

Key questions for the summer fellow include:

• What are the key insights from the data we have gathered so far? What patterns can we detect around, e.g., areas of complaints, geographical location, and response time?
• How should resident requests be prioritized and addressed to ensure an equitable and transparent approach?
• What additional data, data tagging, or analysis can be employed to improve the quality of our service continuously?
• How well do we understand who is currently engaging with the Department of Customer Services? Who are we not reaching?
• What channels/mechanisms work best to provide equitable access?
• What suggested services, means of communication, and process improvement will ensure we meet all customer needs?
• How can we measure success as a department?

What You’ll Do

The fellow will work closely with stakeholders from across the city of Racine, specifically the Director of the Department of Customer Service and a newly appointed Communications Director. Throughout the ten weeks, the fellow will be expected to:

1. Organize and structure existing data, using our new CRM
2. Develop a recommendations report, highlighting:
   • Additional data collection needs
   • Changes required to current data points (e.g., data tags)
   • Format, audience, and frequency of key data reports
3. Outline a resident engagement approach to help us better understand the user experience. This might include:
   • Developing recommendations for engagement channels (e.g., surveys, focus groups, online forms)
   • Drafting questions
4. Work with our communications team to develop recommendations for resident outreach and engagement, focusing specifically on communities that are disengaged

What You’ll Bring

• Data Analysis
• Policy Analysis
• Qualitative Interviewing and Analysis
• Behavioral Analysis
• Mapping (GIS)