The Babcock Center is the largest private provider of community services for people with severe lifelong disabilities in South Carolina. With a large network of support and housing opportunities, they needed a large-scale automated solution to solve their outdated intake process – and they found it with Cognito Forms.
Finding a Fluid Solution for a Diverse Screening Process
The Babcock Center’s mission is to empower people with lifelong disabilities to enjoy life by promoting abilities and respecting choice. They offer nearly 68 residential programs throughout South Carolina, with support options ranging from independent supported living to intensive 24-hour care.
Through the support of the Babcock Center, nearly 5,000 adults with disabilities throughout South Carolina receive daily vocational training, and over 800 adults with disabilities have been employed in the marketplace and earn competitive wages.
Processing the number of applicants for the Babcock Center’s intake system was an arduous task, mainly due to having to deal with mountains of paperwork passing through multiple departments. This often led to lengthy delays in finalizing house placements and increasing the time it took for an applicant to be approved.
“We wanted to maintain our application information all in one place,” says Tonya Bradford, Director of Quality Control. “Then be able to send the applicant information to each department to receive feedback and notify specific people via email.”
In the past, gathering data could be a project that required time that the departments simply didn’t have. Now the automated workflow can pass virtually pass through a department, depending on their role, without getting stuck at a desk.
Knocking Down Internal Roadblocks
Cognito Forms makes it easy for the staff of the Babcock Center to collaborate and build on each other’s work. From the beginning of the process when a person applies to be part of the program, Babcock Center shares a basic form through email, and members of each department (Residential, Vocational, Nursing, Behavioral) review and complete a pre-screen. And after all interested parties complete the pre-screen, a meeting date is set with the applicant. An integration through Cognito Forms allows these meetings to populate on their calendar.
“Every time we needed a department to approve an applicant, it was a big ask,” she said. “Being able to turn around forms quickly has been a huge improvement for us.”
The ability to customize and adapt their forms equates to huge time savings for staff – especially those who were quick to adopt the more technical workflow features offered by Cognito Forms.
The solution included creating a multi-step workflow within Cognito Forms where they can:
Manage employees and nearly 68 locations
Create & update the intake application
Send off for review to multiple departments
Accept or decline for screening
Use an integration to schedule a placement interview
Conduct screening interview in person or online
Accept or decline the applicant
Improving the Approval Process To Ensure Seamless Communication Between Teams
By implementing these workflow-powered solutions, the Babcock Center has experienced significant improvements in productivity and scheduling efficiency, allowing them to focus more on their mission to support individuals with disabilities.
Using workflow has sped up the response time for screening. We are able to schedule meetings and obtain feedback quickly from multiple members of our team who are often in different locations. The use of Cognito Forms and workflow has helped facilitate a more efficient response to those who are interested in receiving services from our organization.
Tonya Bradford, Babcock Center
The Babcock Center continues to find new ways to leverage Cognito Forms to amplify its mission to be a resource and change-maker proudly serving the individuals, employers and community of South Carolina.
Haley Nelson
Haley, the Content Specialist for Cognito Forms, helps customers discover how they can use the product to elevate their business. She knows that when it comes to getting things done, Cognito Forms is the perfect tool. When not at work, you can find her hiking, listening to podcasts, or buying plants.