Technology – Subject Matter Minute Blog

Subject Matter Minute, Episode #59 – Open Enrollment Changes 2023

The below post is taken from the Video Blog, the Subject Matter Minute. If it’s a little hard to read, it’s because it’s taken from the spoken word. You can view the episode on YouTube if you would like. Find it here: Episode #59 – Open Enrollment Changes 2023

If YouTube is blocked for you or your agency, you can scroll to the bottom of this post to view it from Google Drive. (I would prefer you view it on YouTube, so I know how many people have watched)

You can also listen to an audio version.

Hello and welcome to the Subject Matter Minute, I’m Matt Nagy, thanks for joining me! I started putting this episode together last week when the weather was still perfect. Has everyone else been enjoying the most perfect fall ever? It may be coming to an end now, but, I can’t believe I had to work last week. There should be a “perfect weather” holiday. Right? (maybe that’s a good retention strategy the state could consider?) anyways… I digress…

Speaking of nature… I want to show you guys a little video of my wife’s office in Steamboat. The quality is really poor, but you’ll get the idea. (Bear Video) The whole family! I guess they were trying to make an appointment! It would be cute except I just read the article about those two wrestlers who were attacked near Cody. If you haven’t read it, search for it… it’s quite a story.

Ok, now that I told you to go outside to enjoy the weather and then basically told you to stay indoors, cause, well, bears…. Let’s get to the content!

As you SHOULD know… we are nearly halfway through Open Enrollment for 2023. And while a month ago might have been better, now still seems like a good time to talk about a few open enrollment changes. (music)

So… open enrollment starts on October 1st and goes through the end of November. This is the time that you can add, drop, and/or make changes to the benefits that we all get through Employees’ Group Insurance. The changes that we make take effect the following year. So the changes we make now are put in place for the 2023 calendar year. While you can go view your benefits on the portal, nothing needs to be done if you aren’t making any changes. However, don’t forget that flex medical and daycare has to be enrolled in each year if you wish to participate.

It seems like for me, the only thing that I sometimes change is the flexible spending account amount. Although I did drop short-term disability last year as I figured I had accrued enough sick leave to cover the short term.

Otherwise, you can go in and change your health insurance deductible,
elect or drop preventive dental and/or the optional dental (if the 3-year waiting rule is met),
you can elect or drop basic and voluntary life insurance (in limited amounts and possible underwriting),
elect, drop or change your vision plan (if waiting period/commitment period met),
elect or drop ambulance coverage (if waiting period is met),
elect or drop short term disability or long-term disability,
elect flexible spending accounts for 2023 .
and finally, add, drop, or change dependents where appropriate. (documents may be needed!)

There are some small changes that will go into effect in 2023. If you recall, vision insurance had a waiting and commitment period of two years. This meant that if you didn’t elect it when you first were hired, or you dropped it, you had to wait 2 years to get it. It also meant that once you elect it, you had to keep it for 2 years. That period has been reduced to 1 year.

The benefit for optional dental has been increased from $1500 to $2000 per calendar year. So if you have optional dental, delta dental will pay up to $2000 for things such as crowns. This is a good thing for me, as my teeth are all sorts of cracked up!

Also, the maximum you can use for the medical reimbursement went up from $2700 to $2850. So, if you are always maxing that account out, you can bump up your monthly amount a bit.

Please keep in mind that I, by no means, have gone through all the details. Sometimes documents are needed, and sometimes you need one thing to get another. There are other waiting periods. But those are details that I’ve gone through in other Subject Matter Minutes, I’ve put links to the appropriate ones below. I have also included a link to a video taking you through the entire portal open enrollment process below. Of course, if you have real questions, important questions, please contact EGI. (contact info on screen)

Finally, please don’t wait until the last minute to get this done. EGI business hours are Monday – Friday 8 am-5 pm, so while we can submit an online enrollment until midnight on 11/30, if you experience any errors or technical problems, there is no way to get assistance after hours. Alright? We are given 2 months to get this done, so get in there and make it happen.

Alright, that’s it for today! But before I go, I want to give a shout-out to Travis McGinnis of Big Piney. It was great chatting with you at the UW football game the other night! It’s great meeting cool state employees like you. Now, everyone… go outside before winter hits…get on your bike, go on a hike, sit on your porch… wait, unless there have been bear sightings nearby.

Subject Matter Minute, Episode #58 – ESS Software Update Introduction

If YouTube is blocked for you or your agency, you can scroll to the bottom of this post to view it from Google Drive. (I would prefer you view it on YouTube, so I know how many people have watched)

You can also listen to an audio version.

Hello and welcome to another Subject Matter Minute! It really is fun doing this show, and by far, the best part is running into you guys on the street. Not a month goes by without someone recognizing me and chatting me up a bit. All you guys are so nice to me and positive about the show. Honestly, I’m lucky to get regular feedback from you, cause I know that doesn’t always happen for folks, and I really hope that somebody is giving you the love out there for what you do for the state. So, know that, at least, I appreciate you and I know that you work hard regardless of the positive feedback, or lack thereof that you get.

Ok, let’s get to it. Before we start, I want to thank Kris Quick and Eydie Trautwein of the Auditor’s office for getting me the information and alerting me to the upcoming Employee Self Service software updates. (music)

The Auditor’s Office utilizes software that most of us are familiar with for accessing things like our pay stubs, W2s, pay details, pay deductions, and more. Known as ESS or Employee Self Service or for managers, manager self service. A large portion of us also uses it to track our time with the timesheet feature. Well, as we all know, while it’s totally functional, it’s not the prettiest thing to look at and it’s somewhat lacking in intuitiveness. Right? Well, as part of an upgrade to the Auditor’s payroll and financial system, we are getting an upgrade to these portals, as well. The biggest changes are that the system “looks” more modern and is easier to navigate, and there is now only one portal or login. Meaning you no longer have to log into separate websites for manager self-service and employee self-service. This new single website will be public facing meaning you can access it on any internet connection.

We are giving this overview to you a bit early, as the project’s go-live date isn’t until March of 2023. I can sense the anticipation out there!

So, all the information you have access to now like paystubs, W2, and benefit details will still be available in the new system. But you should be able to find the information more quickly, because of the improved navigation.

One of the things I’m looking forward to most is the coming improvements in the timesheet and leave request portion of ESS. For example, we will be able to freeze columns while we scroll across the timesheet and I’m being told that the ability to copy from a previous timesheet has been improved.

Managers will see some improvements as well! You will have greater access to your employee’s information, including being able to view current as well as historical timesheets, employee emergency contact info, and assignment details. Timesheet and leave request approvals have been simplified, which includes the look of the timesheet being the same for the manager as the employee. Now, I’m not a manager, so I’m just assuming that these are improvements for you guys. 🙂

Here are a couple of screenshots of what the new home pages will look like for the employee and manager roles in the system. Each role will have a navigational video embedded right on the home page so you will have access to these resources, regardless if it’s a weekend or after hours.

In the top left of the screen, you will see a 9-square grid of quick links that will take you directly to the most used pages or resources. Then surrounding the 9-square grid will be an assortment of widgets to assist with approvals, profile information, and calendars.

Employee Role View

Manager Role View

Again, these changes will not go into effect until March of 2023. Over the next six months, the State Auditor’s Office will be sending out further communications and videos to help prepare everyone for the change. Kris and Eydie, who I mentioned earlier, are very excited about the new look and feel and added functionality of the system, and hopefully, it will help us all out while we are in there, navigating through all of our financial info.

For more information, contact the State Auditor’s Office at (307) 777-7831 or go to their website here: https://sao.wyo.gov/upgrade/.

That’s it for this subject matter minute… Like I mentioned at the beginning… I’m looking forward to running into more of you guys out on the street, so don’t hesitate to say hello! See ya then!

Subject Matter Minute, Episode #57 – Introduction to NEOGOV

If YouTube is blocked for you or your agency, you can scroll to the bottom of this post to view it from Google Drive. (I would prefer you view it on YouTube, so I know how many people have watched)

You can also listen to an audio version.

Hello and welcome to another Subject Matter Minute, I’m Matt Nagy, thanks for joining me! So there’s been a new development in the Nagy family recently. (felt like it was time for an update) Due to the physically debilitating nature of Dental Hygiene, which is what my wife does, she decided that she needed to reduce her hours. Unfortunately, that didn’t work for the Dentist she had been working for for the last 10 years, so she started looking around. We found that there were a ton of jobs available in Colorado. Like most sane people, we love Steamboat and Tanna was able to snag a great job there. So, yeah… she’s commuting to Steamboat now. Kinda crazy, I know! She works 3 days a week, which means she leaves early morning Tuesday and comes back to Laramie Thursday evening. The only reason we can pull this off is because we have some friends who have a second home outside of Steamboat and for a nominal fee, they let Tanna stay there two nights a week. She loves it, so what can you do? It’s our new reality.

Alright… for this episode, I want to thank HRD’s very own Jared Hanson for helping me out with the information. Thanks Jared, as always! Today we are going to talk about a new suite of software by a company called Neogov.

So, what is Neogov? All of us have, obviously, applied for a job at one point or another for the State of Wyoming, right? Well, if you did so in the last 10 years or so, the website that you used is Neogov. Neogov is the current system utilized to build job postings, advertise jobs, and collect applications. The system is managed by the Department of Administration & Information – Human Resources Division, but is obviously used by many more. Up until this point, this is all Neogov has been used for. Well, after a tedious RFP process, the state’s use of Neogov is expanding.

Some of you may recall a few years ago, hearing something about the Government Efficiency Commission. This commission was tasked with identifying opportunities in state government that could increase efficiency and reduce costs. As a result of these efforts, many recommendations were made – one of which was consolidating HR systems. All of us are familiar with the PMI system, Saba Talent Space. This was the system we had been using to complete performance evaluations. This video is not about that process – I know we all have mixed feelings about that. Instead, this video is to prepare you for some upcoming changes in PMI and other areas as a result of HRD’s efforts to consolidate systems.

So, what does all of this mean to you and I? You may have seen something from your HR team during the PMI Planning Phase about Saba Talent Space going away. This is indeed true. As I mentioned, HRD completed multiple RFPs over the course of the last year –and– Neogov was selected as the vendor, not only to use them for what we have been using them for… recruiting, but also for conducting performance evaluations. As we speak, the PMI Continuous Improvement steering committee group is meeting to discuss changes needed with PMI and how these can be incorporated into the new Neogov system. In the meantime, PMI is on hiatus. (I’m guessing some of you look a little too happy) Look for more information to come from the committee as decisions are made.

I’m sure that this means more training to come. One of the hats I wear (besides this amazing show) is training, so yes, sadly for many of you, I enjoy creating training. As many of you supervisors remember from the previous PMI training. The part that I’m most excited about, and that you guys might be the least excited about is that Neogov will be providing the State of Wyoming a new learning management system. This is where trainers put training. It allows trainers to build courses and conduct statewide or agency-specific training. This won’t change how you access certain training. ETS still has its own training platform and many agencies offer job-specific training utilizing a variety of platforms. So, this won’t be a one-stop shop…at least initially… we hope to eliminate some training platforms over time. HRD is building a training unit that’s part of HR Centralization so there will be more workforce development and HR compliance training available in the future. Once built, these opportunities will all be found in Neogov.

The changes that include Neogov don’t stop there. Other modules that are in the plan include onboarding and eforms. I’m sure everybody has had a different experience, positive or negative, as it relates to onboarding. This is something that HRD hopes to improve with HR Centralization. Neogov should make the process more efficient and hopefully make the experience a positive one for all the new employees.

Eforms is document and workflow management software. It is HRD’s hope that manual forms can be converted into an electronic format using this software. Yes – it’s about time!

Unfortunately, I don’t have a sneak peek for you at this time (that will be a future SMM), but if you are interested in learning more right now, feel free to visit neogov.com. (I put some links below) They have a full list of all their products and some good reading material about the modules mentioned.

Again, this process has just started. As timelines and other expectations are established, they will be shared. In the meantime, if you have any feedback about HR systems or processes used in the past, please let someone on your HR team know. We will be using Neogov for many years to come and are hopeful that this system will work for everyone, not just HR- employees, supervisors, everyone.

Alright, I gotta go. I promised my wife that I would telework from Steamboat this week – she’s been missing me a bit – so I got to get my pile ready as we leave at 5:30 in the morning.

Oh…. one last thing. There are two fabulous state employees out there that are getting hitched this weekend. I want to say congratulations to Seth and Laura! Can’t wait to celebrate, and sweat, with you guys in the 98 degree weather of Thermopolis! Bye everyone…

Subject Matter Minute, Episode #52 – Wyoming Ready App

If YouTube is blocked for you or your agency, you can scroll to the bottom of this post to view it from Google Drive. (I would prefer you view on YouTube, so I know how many people have watched)

You can also listen to an audio version.

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Subject Matter Minute. I’m Matt Nagy, thanks for joining me. So… did you go look at the workforce report that I covered in the last episode? I don’t know about you, but I get asked all the time how many people work for the state. Questions like, “are they all in Cheyenne.” Or even, “are there jobs available at the state?” Well, you can get those answers and so many more by giving that report a quick look-see.

Ok… let’s talk about today’s subject. Today I’m going to take a look at an app created by the Wyoming Office of Homeland Security called “Wyoming Ready.”

The world is a bit crazy right now. Maybe that has always been the case, but between angry people and an angry environment, it seems especially so now. So…. whether you are paranoid or not, it’s probably a good idea to be prepared for a natural or man-made disaster. Well, the Wyoming Office of Homeland Security has just made that much easier. They have created an app called Wyoming Ready that allows you to create a preparedness plan that is unique to you and your family. It will help with your plan depending on the answers or options you select. A family of two will have different needs than a family of 5 – have an infant? That changes it a bit more. The plan is stored on your phone, not on a server, which is important if systems go down. You can scan important documents like insurance paperwork, enter Dr’s phone numbers, and more. Program the contact information of close friends and family so that you can let them know your status with one message. Create a kit using the checklists. This way in an emergency it will be at your fingertips. This app really makes all of this quite easy.

It also has great preparedness information and it’s all in one central location.

So, are you interested in taking it for a test drive? First of all, if you want to follow along, or just want to get it going right now, just go to the app store on your device and download the app Wyoming Ready. It’s a brown icon with the steamboat on it. I’m going to go through the app and show you what’s involved.

Ok, so first of all, your’s will probably look a bit different than mine since I’m using the smallest and oldest phone that actually still works, the iPhone SE. I’m proud of my little phone.

When you open the app, this is what it looks like. (below, left)

Just like the app says, we’re going to start here by clicking on the menu in the upper left. Like I mentioned, you can set it up for your family by clicking on ‘make your plan.’ I’ll show you that real quick but I’m gonna go back to it here eventually. I’ve completed five of six of my profile items. (above, center) When you’ve completed them they’re in color and when you haven’t they’re grayed out still like the emergency contacts. I’m gonna come back to that… that’ll be the last thing we look at.

First, let’s go into checklists. (above, right) Here’s a bunch of checklists that can help you be prepared for these things… flood readiness, wildfire, severe weather. So you go into it and click on the item and there’s a checklist. All these things that you should have done or should do that you can check off when you do them. So that’s pretty handy. I’m going to uncheck those because I’m not really reading through them right now. I have not done any of those at this point.

The next item is assessments. (above, left) There’s an assessment in here for flood preparedness. You click on that, you click on that, and it’ll take you through questions to help you assess your level of flood preparedness, just like it says there.

They have a news section (above, center) that has a bunch of articles related to these sorts of things. Good reading in there.

They have an faq (above, right) because they’ve received a lot of questions about these sorts of things. Covid-19, emergency notifications, flood preparedness, immigration, scams, wildfire, and Wyoming Search and Rescue. So you can check out the frequently asked questions in there.

They also have events. There’s only one and for some reason it’s untitled but it is an event. Looks like it’s the ‘great Wyoming shakeout’ which is about earthquake preparedness. So you can add those to your calendar and get more information.

Then finally at the bottom is contact us. You can call them directly… to the office of homeland security, by calling that number.

Let’s go back to ‘make your plan’ since that’s kind of the main thing. When you first come in here you’re obviously not going to have anything completed and there’ll be a status bar at the top telling you how many things you’ve filled out and how many you haven’t. First of all, you want to go through here and fill out this profile information. You can see along the bottom there’s ‘profile’ and then ‘prepare,’ ‘respond,’ ‘recover,’ and ‘status.’ So this is the profile area. You’ll go through each one and fill in the information. As you can see, I have all my household in there. (above, left) You simply click the plus in order to add one. Then you can see under my name… I’m clicking on myself here… my information is in there. (above, center) If I want to edit it I click edit and I add more information. There are things at the bottom like ‘important documents,’ ‘places,’ ‘vehicles’ and ‘photos’ and ‘notes.’ (above, right) You can fill those in for each person. The idea is if you are generally at a place for a big portion of the day or something like your job at an office, that’d be good to have in here to know where you are so people can find you. Same with vehicles… if you drive a vehicle more than any of your other ones… that’s kind of your vehicle… put that in there and put it under your profile. So go through and put all this information in including your animals. Emergency contacts… emergency contacts could be my friend Steve across the street, my family in Lander… but it also can be doctors, therapists, anybody who’s going to help you in an emergency. And then there are the reminders. Basically, it will remind you to review your profile and review your emergency kit after a certain amount of time.

Let’s go to ‘prepare’ now. Once you go into prepare there’s a whole bunch of information in here… things that you can read and get ready. (above, left) General tips… they’ll have general information. (above, center) Supplies, shelter, health and well-being, important documents… all these things…if you go into important documents (above, right) you’ll see the things they say you should have done. An emergency kit… general items you should have in your emergency kit… food and water, health and hygiene… all these things. And then a meeting place. Your family needs to know where to meet each other in the case of an emergency, so pick a place put it in here.

Let’s go to ‘respond’ now. (above, left) Same deal… a whole lot of information… go bags, how to respond during a disaster, meeting places… so you can go through that and fill all those in.

Then we have ‘recover’… general tips on how to recover after a disaster. (above, center) It goes through each item… earthquakes, tornadoes, thunderstorms and lightning, home fires, wildfires… and it gives you ideas about how to recover. And you can add your own ideas.

Now let’s go to status. (above, right) This is where you can share your status either via text or email with the people that you have included in your profile, including emergency contacts… so you can send everybody something that says “I am safe.” That is the default message… that would go out to everyone that you check. So if systems are still up and you’re able to send a text or an email, that would be amazing just to let everyone know you’re okay.

So that’s the setup that you go through to be prepared for disaster…

There’s one thing I need to say… since it’s stored on your phone, you can’t share it across devices, so if you and your spouse or even your kids want this information on their phone, you’re gonna have to individually add it. It’s actually on your phone so if the systems go down it’s there for you.

That’s Wyoming Ready, the app made by the Wyoming Office of Homeland Security… try it out… I think it’s a good idea to use it. Go through it and see what’s available at least.

Before I go I want to thank Kelly Ruiz, the public information officer at the Wyoming Office of Homeland Security for getting me all the information… thanks, Kelly I appreciate it.

That’s it for today’s subject matter minute I’ll see you next time!

Subject Matter Minute, Episode #49 – ETS Customer Portal

You can also listen to an audio version.

Hey, hey, hey! Welcome to another episode of the Subject Matter Minute. I’m Matt Nagy, thanks for joining me.

So, this is episode #49, and since we all love round numbers, we are going to count the next episode, number 50, as something special. I’m planning on an unusual episode that hopefully is entertaining, and I’m giving away prizes. Here’s how the prizes are going to work. After viewing episode #50, anybody who wants a chance to win will need to make a comment in the show comments, letting everyone know what their favorite part of the episode is. If you do this, you will be entered into the drawing for several gifts. If you get someone else to subscribe to my channel (that wasn’t subscribed before), and they respond to your comment telling me they did so, you will get another entry. The subscriber will also get an entry. Also, if you email me directly, and tell me how much you love the show, you will get another entry. Ok? I will remind everyone of the rules during episode #50 as well.

Today’s topic is about something that I hope you don’t have to use very often. A very large segment of our workforce at the state spends at least some time on a computer or dealing with technology in one way or another. We have an entire agency that is here to help us when things go wrong or if we need to figure out what type of technology we need. Obviously, that’s ETS. (Enterprise Technology Services)

Today I’m going to talk about the Customer Portal. (music)

If you’ve had problems before, you may know the 2 ways that we’ve contacted ETS in the past. Email, at Helpdesk@wyo.gov and via phone at 777-5000. Well, now there is a third way, and perhaps, a better way to contact them. Naturally, your first question is going to be, “Why? Why not just call or email them?” Well, I asked them that too. For one thing, the portal does more than just allow you to contact ETS for help with issues or requests for tech. You can search a knowledge base for answers to typical problems and/or questions. You can check for outages, and as a little bonus, they’ve added a section that has links to commonly used State websites.

Personally, I think it’s better than a call because I don’t like to talk on the phone. And it’s better than email because you are putting the issue or request directly into the system and not waiting for ETS to do it when they receive your email.

All right… whether you think it’s better or not, I’m going to show you where it is and how to use it.

To get to the portal, go to this address either on your computer or your device: https://service.wyo.gov/. I’m going to go through it here in a minute.

If you are logged into your computer with your Active Directory login, you will be automatically logged-into the Service Portal. If you are accessing the portal through a non-state computer,

you log in with your Active Directory login credentials. This is the info that you use to login to your State of Wyoming computer. If you do not have these credentials because you are not a State employee, contact the help desk and they will get you lined out.

To get to the portal you go to service.wyo.gov which actually reroutes you to this page. This is the page you’ll see, and then use your credentials to log in, or if you’re already logged in on your computer at the state you will automatically come to this page. This is the support portal.

Right away you can see the most important things right here: request something, the knowledge base, and get help. Get help is actually an incident. You can also see the navigation up here at the top where you can see my incidents, my requests, the knowledge base, and a nice little helpful thing right here I want to mention right away is the tours button. Each important page, which would be get help, knowledge base, request something, and this home page has a tour that you can start. That’ll take you through and show you how to use the system, so if you don’t use this for a long time after you watch this fabulous video you can always use that to reacquaint yourself.

First of all, let’s talk about the difference between requesting something and getting help or logging an incident. You use the request something when you need something new; a new service or something like that or if you need a new computer, new software program, or a new printer. Get help is an incident or something that was working before but is no longer working… something that is broken.

The knowledge base is a nice place to start because they’re adding helpful information in there about common problems or common incidents that perhaps you can fix yourself.

Other things to notice down here… if there are some announcements that ETS finds important they’ll put them down here. I’ve been told that if there’s an outage it’ll more than likely be up in the top area in bright letters letting you know what’s going on. Lesser announcements will be down here. Here are some top-rated articles from the knowledge base, basically the ones that people are looking at the most. And then you can see your open incidences and your open requests over here.

And finally down below all that they have some handy links for you; typical or important Wyoming links, your saba, your PMI, your retirement pension, your payroll ess… just a nice place to be able to go to all those from.

Let’s go into request something. So you can see these are the popular items, but you can also see all the things over here. So when you click on request something it’ll take you to this page but these are all the requests as well, so you could check out software and applications… and I can get software installation here, I can request a quote for something. Firewall patching… don’t know what that is, hotfix application, don’t know what that is, but perhaps you do. And then hardware. Hardware installation, another request to quote, and then other request is something if you don’t see anything that really fits your situation you use other requests. There’s also the communication and network area if you need a new desk phone, you need a network port activated or something like that. So most of these things are in here… most of the things you typically need are in here. But if not, you can do other requests.

However, before you do that, you can also search for categories. For instance, let’s search for printer here. This brings up the two possible printer results. And this does bring us to a broader point… you can search anywhere. So if you search on the home page that’ll bring up the two things we saw before as well as the knowledge base articles. Then if you go into the knowledge base that’ll bring up the knowledge base articles. So it brings up the appropriate thing for the area that you’re in. It’s probably better to do a little searching as opposed to just using the other category when you’re doing a request or an incident. So do a little searching first.

I’m going to go back to the home page. When you come in to get help or log an incident it actually goes to the same area but it starts off on can we help you. Create incident… anything that used to work and is now not working is an incident.

I’m going to say that I am going to request something and I’m going to request software installation. This is what shows up, not very many things to fill out which is nice. Obviously, some things are required… the red dots. They’re also showing the required things over here; as you do them they’ll disappear over here. You can read the instructions here on what to do so.

I’m going to say I want Microsoft office. I’m going to put in the key for the software if we’ve already purchased it or something like that… or the license number. I’m going to say yes I’ve already purchased it. Now typically this will auto-populate when your name shows up, however, my situation was a little different so I’ve got to find my agency which is right here. Install location… put in that information. Preferred install time of day… I’ll be there in the morning. In this situation, you probably don’t need to add any attachments but I’ll show you one that I’ve done before where I did add attachments for a request and you’ll see what that looks like. Once you fill all that out you see that all the required things are now gray and these are gone over here. I’m gonna go ahead and click request.

Now, this pops up… you can add additional information if you want to, or if you need to, you know special instructions like, you’ll have to talk to the front office person to get into my office if I’m not there, blah blah blah. So make sure that’s correct.

If you’re requesting for somebody else, which you can do, you would have done it here, but then you also need to put their name right here, because it auto-populates with your name. Then I’m going to hit request. That submits it and that brings it into the request. There’s a number right here in case you need to let them know what that is if you’re discussing it on the phone or by email. And it shows that it’s opened just now, and where it’s at in the process. So that is doing a request. Your information is going to be over here. The things you input and the things that they input are going to be on this side… it’s a conversation, it goes back and forth as you go through the process.

I mentioned that if you want to add attachments to perhaps show screenshots of the issue or any other attachments that you might need, that they show up in your request or incident. Let’s go into my requests. So my request is something for our online learning area… this is what I typed in and then I attached three different screenshots to show what I’m talking about. That’s how that works. Then at any time, you can type a message here to add more information, so if something comes up down the road before they’ve fixed the issue you can add more information by typing your message in that line and hitting send.

Now I’m going to do get help which is an incident. This is going to be exactly the same but I’m going to create an incident. It’s a little bit less information. This is kind of urgent and then you put in as good a detail as you can what the incident is… my computer’s restarting randomly… that’s not good! So that’s all there is to it here… I’m going to hit submit. My incident is now created, and here’s the incident. When you do this you will get an email telling you that you filled these things out. As you can see I got one here for my request, so you can always click on that to see it. You can see the open requests down here. I have a software installation. You can look at it that way or you can go up to my requests. So it shows Microsoft office, the license information, and all that. And now you can see I also have the email about the incident… it shows exactly what it is. It looks a little different than a request. You can also go to my incidences and click on it there and see it as well.

After you submit an incident or a request the first thing you’ll notice is that it gets assigned to somebody right up here and when it’s in progress the state will be in progress or open. These were pretty easy so they remoted into my pc, installed the software, and closed the ticket because it was as simple as that. That’s the Microsoft office. Then the incident where my computer was randomly restarting… same deal, it was assigned to somebody at ETS, that was the first thing I saw, and then they said we ran windows automatic troubleshooting, and the problem appears to be fixed. So that was all automatic… didn’t have to come to my office or anything. If, on the software installation or something that needed somebody in office they probably would have first commented and said okay let’s schedule this for next Wednesday at blah blah blah, but since they didn’t have to they simply fulfilled the request and closed the ticket. Now you can see it’s closed and complete.

I have all these emails… this was the software installation it was done, and then my computer randomly restarting… I got that one, it’s been resolved, and it appears to be fixed. So it’s all resolved.

Now when an ETS tech closes out a request or incident you will receive an email like I just showed you, and the request or incident will disappear from your list. So now if I go into my incidences that incident is gone. And then the requested items same deal. The one that I just made today is gone now.

If you go to your home page you’ll notice that your open incident is still there… my computer is restarting randomly. This will stay in this for seven days even though it’s closed and then it’ll disappear from here. If you need access to the information in the future you can always click on the link in the resolve email that you received to access the details. In the future you’ll be able to close out an incident or request yourself, so keep an eye out for that functionality, but for now, ETS needs to close the incident or request.

Ok, folks, that’s the ETS Customer Portal. Get in there and use it. They may already be tired of me using it by now.

Alright… remember that the next episode is the big #50 celebration. Watch it, comment, and you might get some swag! As always, thanks for watching the Subject Matter Minute, I’ll see ya next time.

Subject Matter Minute, Episode #40 – Leave

You can also listen to an audio version.

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Subject Matter Minute, I’m Matt Nagy, thanks for joining me! If this is your first time here…. Shame on you. (chuckle) Nah, just kidding… but if it is, you can find a link in the show notes to all the episodes and get yourself all caught up.

A brief mention of something related to one of the last regular episodes we had. It was about air ambulances in Wyoming. It was a little while back… episode #34. I got several emails from folks who have been paying yearly fees to ambulance companies or hospitals that were meant to cover a trip in an air ambulance. Well… just so you all know… The legislature passed a law that no longer allows membership plans like this. So if you are paying, stop! Or at least check into it.

I was going to treat that one person who really dislikes when I share personal info to some new stuff today, but then the episode got a bit long, so…. Sorry…. Maybe next time. 🙂

Let’s get to it… Did you know that there are 16 different types of leave available to state of Wyoming employees? I briefly covered the 2 major ones in an earlier episode, episode #12 – Full Benefits Package, but I haven’t covered the other 14.

So today, let’s talk about Leave.

So, the 2 major types of leave are Vacation and Sick leave. Since there are so many to cover, I’m going to leave those to episode #12. Let’s cover the other 14 as quickly as possible. Speaking of that… if you need all the details of any of them, you can find everything in the Personnel Rules Chapter 6… which is linked below.

The first one is a bit timely for me as I recently used some when my grandfather passed away. His funeral was in Georgia, so it was nice that you can take 5 days of bereavement leave when a family member dies. That gave me the week to deal with a wide range of things down there.

The next type of leave is Holiday Leave. Full time employees are given 8 hours leave per holiday from regularly scheduled work hours. We get:

New Years
Martin Luther King Jr.
President’s day
Memorial day
Independence day (4th of July)
Labor day
Veteran’s day
Thanksgiving
Christmas

It’s a day for each holiday. Unfortunately, it’s not like the University that gets a sweet Christmas vacation. We get one day. … but we’ll take it.

There are several if’s and when’s under holiday leave, so feel free to read about it in Chapter 6. But, generally, it’s a straightforward holiday day-off.

Next is Exempt Paid Time Off. So, if any employee exempt from overtime is required to work on a holiday they are granted paid time off at one and one-half hours for each hour worked. A little “thank-you” for taking one for the team and working on a holiday.

Next is Parental Leave. I cover this in full in episode #31. Check it out. But, what it says in short is that employees may, with Agency head approval, take accrued sick leave, comp time, vacation leave, or leave without pay beyond the time allowed under Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) for purposes associated with the birth or adoption of a child.

Voting Leave. We are given 1 hour of leave with pay to go vote. Simple.

Ok… Court Leave. This one was interesting to me because I am currently in the jury pool and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to serve. I wasn’t sure if I’d get paid. Well, turns out we do. If you are called for jury duty or as a witness of the court, you are granted leave with pay. It says you need to provide written documentation of the obligation, but we do get paid. So that’s cool. Now I kinda want to get on a jury. 🙂

Now here’s one for all those who have interest in serving the state in a different capacity. Legislative Leave. If you get elected to the legislature, you have to take time served in that position as leave without pay. Sounds a little odd, but you do get compensated for performing these duties by the Legislative Branch, and on the bright side, you can keep your job.

Ok, let’s talk about Educational Leave. This one is fascinating. I kinda doubt this ever happens, but you can actually get leave for up to 24 months to acquire job-related training or education. Of course, this is up to the Agency head. Believe it or not, the rules are open to it being either paid or unpaid. So… if you can find a very convincing reason to get some training and you have a super cool agency head, you could get paid to get that training.

Next is Administrative Leave. This is used for several things. First of all, an agency head may grant an employee administrative leave with pay to participate in meetings, seminars, hearings, examinations, and employee organization meetings. I don’t even know what some of those things are, but for any other purposes, you have to get approval from the Governor.

This is also the type of leave that the Governor gives for local celebrations, like Cheyenne Day, and if they need to shut things down because of weather, or anything else he/she deems necessary. One of the popular and regular administrative leave days is the day that is given for the Friday after Thanksgiving. That’s an example of administrative leave.

Ok…. Personal Leave. This one is at the agency head’s discretion. They can give us up to two regularly scheduled days of personal leave. So, 16 hours. There is a specific list of things that it can be given for.

Employee recognition programs;
Participating in department wellness initiatives;
Merit incentive programs
Team-based recognition – project completion
To volunteer
Family departing or returning from active duty military service; and
To attend military funerals.

Now some of these have to have prior approval from HRD, so look closer if you want to set something up. Also, volunteering has some rules associated with it, so check those.

There are a few prohibited activities. Personal Leave can not be granted for:

Birthdays
Early release for holidays, and
Undocumented performance

Next is Military Leave. I’m just going to send you to the Statute for that. All it says in our rules is that it shall be granted in accordance with Wyoming Statute 19-11-108.

Leave Without Pay. This type of leave is granted at the discretion of the agency head. This type of leave can basically be used for anything that the agency head decides warrants it. But there are some specific uses associated with it.

If you are injured on the job and receiving workers comp, you can use LWP.
An employee on military leave is entitled to LWP.
You can use LWP when all other leave has been exhausted, with permission, for medical reasons.

Please note that for everything except legislative leave, an employee has to use all accrued comp time, vacation or other available leave before leave without pay will be authorized.

The Governor may furlough employees due to lack of work or funding. An employee furloughed for lack of funding is on leave without pay.

Administrative Review Leave.

This is not typically good leave… but it’s not always bad. This is leave that you get placed on… for a maximum of thirty (30) days.

This traditionally happens when you have been charged with or are under investigation for a crime, or Allegations of misconduct have been made; or

You fail a fitness for duty evaluation; or, finally…

You need to be removed from the workplace because you are a witness or the complainant in an investigation.

And, finally, FMLA. FMLA is an episode unto itself, but suffice it to say, this federal act entitles eligible employees to take unpaid, job-protected leave for specified family and medical reasons with continuation of group health insurance coverage under the same terms and conditions as if the employee had not taken leave.

I will probably do an episode on that in the future, but I did put some information about it in the show notes. We did a very detailed video back in 2018 that you can watch if you really need to know.

Now I wasn’t going to mention Covid-19 in this episode, but there are a couple of new types of leave that have been created because of it. The Emergency Paid Sick Leave Act or EPSLA which provides up to 80 hours of paid sick leave for employees for six qualifying reasons related to COVID-19. And the Emergency Family and Medical Leave Expansion Act (EFMLEA), which expands the federal Family and Medical Leave Act to provide leave for employees who are unable to work, including work-from-home, as a result of having to care for a minor child due to a COVID-19 related closure of a school or childcare center.

If you need more info on those at this time, please contact your HR representative. Or if you just need general info, google it.

Holy smokes…. I’m so sorry this ended up so long. But, there are 16 types of leave… So much for Subject Matter MINUTE, eh? Well, thanks for hanging in there, and I’ll see you next time.

Subject Matter Minute, Episode #39 – LinkedIn Learning

You can also listen to an audio version.

Hello and welcome to another gritty episode of the subject matter minute. All right, I know the show is not gritty by any means, but sadly I actually have had to edit out a couple of things that I thought was funny, but others didn’t… you know? Speaking of that… once again we are walking on eggshells as state employees. There’s grim budgetary news. Because of this, this couldn’t be a better time to expand our skillset or strengthen our skill set. The State Library just recently signed a contract with LinkedIn learning that gives us access to their huge library of excellent courses. Some of you may have used it in the past, it was called lynda.com, but LinkedIn bought them out. They have a huge library of professionally produced training on a wide range of topics. Check this out.

When you sign in with your library card this is the page you will see if you want to see all the subjects just come up to library and hover over it okay and then you can go down each of these main subject areas to see all of the courses available and they have divided it up into topics software and learning paths I’ll go over that stuff more here in a bit but you can see we have a huge amount of courses available to us.

Let’s back up a second and show you how to get access to the LinkedIn library courses. You need a Wyoming library card to do this. In order to get your State library card to access all these courses and all this other
fabulous stuff the library has, you need to go to library.wyo.gov. There’s probably several ways to get there, but what I did was went to ‘using the library’ ‘for state employees,’ and then down to ‘get a library card.’ That opens a new tab. You fill this out. Because of COVID, right now, you will be emailed a library card number and password,and eventually, we’ll all get physical library cards once COVID- 19 is over.

Once you have your library card number and a password you’ll come to this page gowyld.net. There are probably several ways to get there again but I’m gonna go to ‘job and career support,’ and then you’ll see LinkedIn learning down here with lynda.com content. If you click on that it brings you to this login page. I’m gonna go ahead and put mine in and login. Now we’re back to that page I showed you before.

I’m gonna go into this a little bit more so first of all that you see at the top we have popular learning paths. Learning paths are really handy because they basically group a bunch of courses in certain topics, and they do it for you so you don’t have to search for them. Here’s a learning path called ‘become a manager,’ it has eight courses in it. ‘Become a project coordinator’ ten courses… these could be good learning paths for state employees. You can also click on ‘see all’ to see all the learning paths that they have put together. As you can see, there are a lot. In each section there are learning paths with many classes in them. You can see ‘to become a project manager’ has 17 hours worth of courseware in there. This is good stuff.

I want to show you here when you first come in new is selected in this row. These are the new courses. You can scroll through here see what they got. ‘Customer service,’ ‘financial wellness,’ ‘talent management,’ … good stuff for PMI. You can also sort it by ‘popular.’ A lot of ‘time management’ up at the top, Microsoft stuff… now I’ve been asked many times where people can get Microsoft training… this is gonna be great stuff for those folks. Then they have some recommended courses. Also ‘popular your organization.’ I’m not sure… that must sort eventually once more people have come in.

If you’re looking for soft skills, perhaps you go to business, and you look at ‘leadership,’ ‘management,’ ‘communication,’ ‘productivity.’ Let’s just go to productivity. Looks like they have weekly videos they make, and then, of course, a lot of the stuff that folks are looking for these days… setting limits on your smartphone, learning zoom. A lot of us are using zoom these days so that could be a good one, and I’m sure they have more than just the basics… they go into advanced modes. Self-motivation, reducing tension… So you can see the kind of things they have.

Now let’s go into a course. Let’s go into ‘learning zoom.’ I just want to show you how they’re set up. It’s very straightforward. It’s video based. I did come in here earlier and checked it out. You can see the ones that I’ve already watched because they show the little eye. Since I’ve already watched them, then you go to the next one. You can see the transcript down here, which is great because it shows you where they are in the words, and you can actually click on the words to skip forward to that spot. If you are watching this from the beginning to the end it’ll automatically go from video to video, otherwise you can skip around find something that you have a question about. ‘How do I record and review meetings,’ and just skip right to it.

As you can see this is set up really nicely and you will find that the video quality is quite amazing. These guys know what they’re doing and they’re professionals. Apparently, LinkedIn produces all of their own stuff in-house.

You can also make your own playlist. You can go through all their courses, find ones that you want to watch in the future, and add them to your playlist. Let’s just go into business analysis foundations. Now, I didn’t actually have to go into it to add it… I’ll go back and show you, but you can add it to your playlist by clicking right here. Let’s go back. You can also add it to your playlist by clicking the plus alongside any of the courses.

This is fairly new to me too. I just wanted to get this information out there so people can hit this right away. I did use lynda.com a while ago… years ago, so I’m somewhat familiar with it, but I’m gonna be diving in checking it out. I didn’t show you all the features, but it’s really straightforward and well-made, so get in there and check out the courses.

I’ve only really gone over LinkedIn learning in this episode, but I would be remiss to not mention the hundreds of other resources that the State Library has for us. Check this out.

This is the home page of gowyld.net. Here you’ll find all the topics and resources available to state of Wyoming employees. So these are all the subjects. You can get ebooks, audiobooks, magazines… so much stuff available to state of Wyoming employees. Let’s go back into job and career support since that’s what we’re talking about today. You have access to Learning Express Library, and here’s LinkedIn learning as well. Look over here, there are auto repair manuals. There is a section for learning a language… enunciator. There’s tests and Skills prep. These are all available to you for free.

Again, on the homepage you can see all the subject areas… so as you can see there are a ton of resources out there to help us expand our skillset, strengthen our skillset, or perhaps just to help us get through these trying times. I truly encourage you to get in there and check it out. I guarantee you will be impressed with the quality of the productions. Ok, that’s it for today… good luck to all of us during this (most recent) stressful time at the state. See you next time.

Subject Matter Minute, Episode #32 – Saba TalentSpace Mobile App

If YouTube is blocked for you or your agency, you can scroll to the bottom of this post to view it from Google Drive. (I would prefer you view in YouTube, so I know how many people have watched)

You can also listen to an audio version.

Hello Fellow State of Wyoming employees… Matt here. Thanks for joining me here on the wild ride that is the Subject Matter Minute.

Before I get started on the subject matter meat, so to speak, I’m guessing that there may be a few of you out there that have gone on an Alaskan cruise? I’m asking because my parents just surprised us with a trip of our own this coming summer. My grandfather, who was about 2 months shy of his 101st birthday, passed this last summer, and apparently still had a little cash left. Well, my mom wanted to use it for a family vacation. So, my parents are going to take me, my wife, my kids and my sister on an alaskan cruise. This is definitely something that was on my bucket list, and I’ve never been on any sort of cruise, so I’m very excited. If you have been on one and have some pointers for us, please feel free to post them in the comments below the video. Or throw me an email… whatever.

Alright… today is a little show and tell episode. Today I’m going to show you how to use the Saba TalentSpace mobile app. (music)

Before I get started, I want to thank Debbie Russi again for helping me sort out the info for the last episode. That was on Maternity leave if you missed it. Remember fellas, that episode isn’t just for the ladies. Go back and check it out.

This episode’s subject matter expert is Brenda Kelly-Mitchell, who administers the PMI system and recently activated the mobile app. Thanks for doing that, and thanks for helping me out Brenda.

I think more and more people out there are starting to use the features of Saba that make it worthwhile. If not, maybe it’s because you don’t want to take the time to sit at the computer, or maybe you simply forget by the time you get to your computer? Well, the app is perfect for those problems. This is “on-demand” documentation. Memories are so much better at the point of incident, right? Being able to take a journal note, or throw out some feedback while in the field, or at the meeting, is much more reliable than doing it a month later.

The app is slick and easy to use. And I’m going to show you what is available on it. Let’s get going.

In order to start the process and get the app functioning, you need an activation code. To do that go to the Saba talent space website, go over to your name on the far right click on it, go to app activation, and then halogen app. I’m fairly certain in the future that will say talentspace app, but for now it still says halogen.

Sometimes it just brings up this feedback page, other times it will bring up the activation code. But if you only get this page and do not see a code, go ahead and do it again. And there you have your activation code.

So once you’ve gone to the website and got the code, you go to your mobile device, download saba talentspace mobile app, and then open it. This is where you add your activation code. Go ahead and put in the site name, which was wyoming, and then the activation code, and then activate.

Now you’re in the saba talentspace mobile app. This is the front page. They like to give you little tips and tricks here on the front… you can dismiss that. You can see down at the bottom there’s a menu where you have home, feedback, talent view, one-to-one meeting, and learning. First of all, from the very front page you can add feedback to somebody. Up by your picture… you see “hi Matthew L, do you have feedback to share” click on that and you can immediately send feedback to somebody. So you choose great job or whichever one. You find someone… you just search for them… you start typing their name, and it’ll give you the options. I’m gonna go ahead and cancel out of that and discard it.

Hold up! Let’s go back a second. I recorded this and then realized there’s a very cool feature within the mobile app that you cannot do on your desktop. You can attach photos! So when you’re in feedback, you see the little photo or a camera icon… click on that and you can insert a photo or take a photo. So if you are giving feedback on something at the time that is right in front of your face, you can take a photo. Or if you previously had a photo you can go insert photo. Go into your photos on your camera… yeah better not, my wife had some pictures of her being very sick… Or take a photo. Allow it to use your camera, and look that’s me recording my phone.

So that is a very very useful feature for feedback on the mobile app. That’s the quickest way to send feedback to somebody.

Another way is you can see on the home page the “my team” at the bottom. You can scroll through your people, and then either click on their face or click on the little three bars below their face and that’ll bring up icons. You can see the feedback icon is the second from the left if you want to send feedback to that person, or if you click on their face it brings up their face in a larger format and gives you some icons as well. You can send email to them, you can send feedback, and unfortunately you can’t call through the system right now. The telephone icon is grayed out. But that’s another way you can send feedback to your people right away.

You can also click in the upper right hand corner where you see the plus feedback icon. Same deal… you click on that, click send feedback, and you go through the process. So this is really really handy for sending feedback to folks.

You can also look at your feedback that you have received or sent by clicking on the feedback icon in the lower menu. These are the received, and then sent, and then you can also look at ones that you have requested, if you ever requested any.

Okay let’s go back to the home screen. We’ve looked at the feedback on the lower screen, let’s look at Talent view next. Talent view basically shows your crew, shows who you work with. Same deal… you can see the hierarchy… if there was a larger hierarchy there would be several layer layers. You can do what I showed you before… you could either click on the little icon and choose email or feedback, or look at their profile, or you can click on their face… same deal… send some feedback, send an email.

So that’s talent view. Next let’s look at one-to-one meeting. So in one-to-one meeting basically it shows the agenda that you’re setting up. These are the agenda items that are automatically put into your one-to-one meeting… any feedback goes in there automatically. You can add an agenda item by clicking on the plus icon to the right of agenda. You can type in the title, describe the agenda item, and add it to your agenda. I’m going to discard that because I’m not making one right now. So that’s a nice way to keep things up to date for your next one-to-one meeting.

If you were to be enrolled in a learning activities on the main site you could see them here under learning.

So that’s a rundown of all the features of the Saba talent space mobile app. If you have any questions you can always click on the menu in the upper left hand corner, click on help, and that will take you to the talent space mobile app help page online. You can look through any of these things. If you need to go back, in the upper left hand corner you click back on the Saba talent space arrow and you’re back in the app.

The mobile app is a fabulous way to send feedback, real-time feedback in the field, or in the meeting or wherever you’re at at the time so you don’t forget what you need to send.

Ok… so that’s the Saba TalentSpace mobile app. I know that 99 percent of you have your phone with you at all times, so this is probably the easiest, and best, way to interact with our performance management system. As an employee or a supervisor, it makes sense to use the system to its fullest and to have an influence over your performance reviews.

That’s it for today! Remember, if you’ve been on an Alaskan cruise and have any tips or tricks or anything we absolutely must do, please let me know! See ya next time.

Subject Matter Minute, Episode #26 – Utilizing the PMI Software Between Phases

You can also listen to an audio version.

Hello and welcome to the Subject Matter Minute. I’m Matt Nagy, thanks for joining me!

So a couple weeks ago my oldest daughter graduated from high school. We had a big party, a lot of family, and some tears. I, of course, was tasked with putting together the video of her growing up. Which means that I literally cried every time I watched it. Yes, I’m a sap. When you are editing, you need to watch it over and over to make sure it times out. So… ouch. There are some really good songs out there for this sort of video and you can’t help but cry. If you want to imagine my pain, listen to “Have it All” by Jason Mraz and “ready, set, don’t go” by Billy Ray Cyrus, and think about your daughter moving on.

Anyway… before I get started with this month’s subject, I want to thank last month’s subject matter expert, Alice Burron. Thanks a ton for getting me the information on your wellness initiatives!

This month’s subject matter expert is….. Well, really, me. As all of you supervisors know, I was heavily involved in the creation of the PMI training that you all had to work through. And, as you know, I pretty much had to know everything about the process. (do silly hand motions) I was also on camera a bit too much. I did some reading from a teleprompter. Sorry… that’s a bit of an inside joke. Apparently, I had a tendency to do some repetitive hand motions, and a friend, who is also a supervisor with the state, couldn’t help but give me a hard time about my hand motions. Thanks Seth!

Today we are going to talk about Utilizing the PMI software between phases.

Because the Planning Phase ended on May 31st, we all now have our goals and Target Ranges for competencies set. This means that you now have all this time before the next phase.. The midyear phase, where you talk about your progress and supervisors give some coaching and all that.

Well, while a lot of folks probably do just wait until that phase opens, it’s really not the most effective way to use the PMI system. This applies to both employees and supervisors and although, there is no right or wrong way to use the system, there are tools available that are designed to be used throughout the year. In between the phases.

As an employee, you can actually affect your evaluation if you stay up on what’s going on. Recording “milestones or jobs well done,” or documenting the difficulties you are having with a goal… If it’s something that’s out of your control, or something like that. Putting these sorts of things in the system, allows your supervisor to easily pull them into the evaluation form.

Ok, I’m going to talk about 3 tools specifically. They are 1 to 1 Meetings, Feedback Central and Goal Notes. I’m just going to introduce these items. They are pretty intuitive and mostly easy to use.

So, are you having regular meetings with your supervisor? Well, you probably should be. Keeping track of progress, bringing up issues… you know the drill. Well, 1 to 1 Meetings allows you to both keep track of what you talk about but it also allows both supervisors and employees to add “agenda items” to a future meeting. So, you think of something that you’ve been meaning to talk about and you quickly make an agenda item for it for the next meeting.

Feedback Central is a central repository for all sorts of documentation. If you go into “all feedback” you will see all the feedback both from you and to you. You can see that I put some journal notes in there. Which is basically a good place to put ideas and thoughts. I have some Great Jobs that were sent to me and I also have some thank yous both going out to others and coming in to me. Your choices are different depending on whether you are a supervisor or not, but both employees and supervisors have several choices within feedback central. As you can see, you can even request feedback.

As I mentioned before, we all now have our goals set in the system. Best practice is to regularly update how you are doing with these goals. You can do this within the goal itself. If you click on one of your goals, it takes you to an area with several things you can adjust and a comment area. So you can select if you are on track or not… you can select a status from the dropdown. You can show the percentage of completion. You can put when you actually started working on the goal and when you finished. And finally, you can put comments in the comments area. This is where you might mention any roadblocks you are experiencing or things you might need to finish up the goal. Anything related to the goal that might help your supervisor understand how it is going.

So, 1 to 1 Meetings, Feedback Central and Goal notes/comments. These are tools you can use to help have some control over your evaluation . You need to use them regularly and when something is actually happening. Don’t wait, as our memories fade quickly. I know mine do!!

Whether or not you like having your performance evaluated, it is necessary. You might as well try to use the PMI system to it’s full potential and use it in a way that will help you and your supervisor do an honest and fair evaluation.

Alright, I gotta go… that was a lot for today! Please come back next month for another exciting and fun filled subject matter minute. See ya then.

Subject Matter Minute, Episode #7 – Medical Reimbursement Process

If YouTube is blocked for you or your agency, you can scroll to the bottom of this post to view it from Google Drive.

You can also listen to an audio version: Episode #7: Medical Reimbursement Process.

Before I get started on this month’s subject I want to talk about the Eclipse. I know that’s kind of a dead horse that’s been beaten in Wyoming, but I was lucky enough to see it in totality, and it was amazing. It was unexpected. I know you’ve heard this from your friends if you didn’t see it in totality but if you didn’t, you need to go chase it in seven years when it goes across the states again! It was super cool.

I was lucky enough to be a part of a big group at Glendo. Ten months ago we reserved three group sites. You had to do it ten months ago, and we had to kind of stay up all night trying to get in, but we did. I was thinking, “what’s what’s the big deal?” I also thought it was kind of expensive. I just wasn’t all that excited, but I am so glad we did.

You know how everyone was saying there was going to be thousands and thousands of people there? Well there might have been, but as you can see by this picture… all of these people are my friends. This is during the Eclipse, during totality, or really close to totality… there is nobody on the beach but us. So we got lucky.

Wyoming Eclipse Group of Friends

Also, when we reserved that campsite, they forced you to do four nights so we didn’t leave till Tuesday morning. We didn’t hit any of the traffic. That being said, I think that 90% of the folks that got stuck in traffic for hours would probably say it was worth it. Again, I thought it was completely unexpected and amazing… the totality part… the rest of it was “meh.” So next time, seven years from now, chase it and go find it!

I’ve got to get to the subject matter because it is a little bit long again. This is a continuation from last month’s episode. I need to thank the subject matter expert, which is EGI (Employees’ Group Insurance), they are also this month’s subject matter experts. Thanks again to EGI.

This month I’m gonna go over the medical reimbursement account process. You use the medical reimbursement account to pay for out-of-pocket expenses. Of course, you’re gonna need documentation/proof that you had these expenses, so we’re gonna go over that… that’s what this is about.

There’s a couple ways you can do this… kind of the old-fashioned way, where you hand in papers, or submit by email, and there’s also a new online portal to submit all your documents. Whichever way you decide to do it, there’s a few things you need. You’re going to need the reimbursement claim form. (It has a much longer name that you’ll see in a few) You’ll need that claim form filled out. You’ll need supporting documentation… most of which is EOBs or explanation of benefits, and receipts and the like. And then for daycare, you’ll either need an itemized receipt or you can have a signature of the provider on the claim form. I will show you how to do that.

First, I’m going to show you how to gather all your stuff, then I’m going to show you how to do it the paper way, and then I’m going to show you how to do it on the online portal.

Let’s go find our EOBs, or explanation of benefits, on the Cigna website.

Go to mycigna.com, and go to the login page. If you don’t have an account, or if you’ve never done this before, you’re going to need to register. You will probably need your insurance card because you’ll need some of that information. Go ahead and do that and then you can log in.

Go to “manage claims and balances” and then down to “claims.” It’s
just showing claims for me (Matthew Nagy), but you can also go to all customers if you have more than one person. Right now I’m looking at this year… if you were doing this the following year, before March 31st, you could do ‘within previous year.’ Since I’m in the middle of the year still, I’m going to look at this as if I wanted to cash out early. Next, hit apply and now you can see everything.

I know some of you might be freaking out that I’m showing this but I really don’t care if you see who my doctors are. 🙂 So now this shows everything. You can see how many providers I’m going to have to list. First of all, this one I owe nothing, so that one’s not going to
be listed. This one we owe nothing, so that one’s not going to be listed. Only the ones that you owe on are you going to be listed. So it looks to me like we’re going to have four providers. As I mentioned before, you
can group them on the flex form. With Bressler, I would put the date range from May 26 to June 9th, and add these all together for the for the money line.

Now let’s talk about how you get your EOBs, because that’s why we’re here.

If you want to get your EOB, you click on their name and that takes you to the information page, and you can see the EOB right here. Now
what I do is right-click on it and open it in a new tab, because if you just
click on it, there is an issue. It opens it up in the same window. If you’re doing it paper-based you would print it, and if you’re gonna submit it online then you would download it now.

Now I’m gonna show you what happens when you go back when you
just click on it. You have to reload the page and continue, so that’s why I suggest that when you go to the EOB you right-click on it and open it in a new tab. Then it just opens it in a new tab and when you’re done with it you can close that tab.

I mentioned that you can group things but you’re still going to have to go into each one and print or save the EOBs.

So you go through all these… you print them or you save them, and you’re ready to go either to mail stuff or to drop it off down at EGI in Emerson or to upload it to the employee portal.

Now that you have all your EOBs in line, let’s go through filling out that form.

Here is the medical reimbursement and dependent care account claim form. That’s a mouthful! It’s pretty straightforward to fill out the upper section: agency name, agency number, your social, your name all that jazz. If it is a new address please check the box so they can update their records.

The medical reimbursement section is here. As I mentioned, you can combine sessions for the same doctor. If you have 4 different sessions to a doctor, you can go ahead and put their name in once, and the date range that those happened in. Then add all the money together for the amount box. Then add them all up and put the total in the total area.

The dependent day care reimbursement area down here is slightly different in that you need to get the tax ID of the provider and the name. Then add the date and the dependent that is being taken care of and the amount. You also either need an itemized receipt from the provider or the signature from the provider for the day care.

Skip the ‘office section only’ and go down to the bottom where you’ll sign it and date it. There’s a lot of good information in here… please read it because there’s instructions about how to submit stuff, and some of the rules associated with this.

So you have all your EOBs, you have your claim form filled out, now let’s go to the online portal and show you how to submit things that way.

You can find the employee portal on the egi website. Typically, you’re probably set up with egi with your state email, so just like other things that you login to (like Wyotraining and those sorts of things) you’ll log in with Google. Choose your state email and then you’re into the portal. It may make you do the two-factor authentication to get in, and you may have to get a number off your cell phone… so do what you have to and you’ll log into the portal…..

PLEASE WATCH THE VIDEO ABOUT THE ONLINE PORTAL. THE TEXT ALONE IS VERY HARD TO FOLLOW. IT HAS BEEN DELETED.

We’ve got to end it here! Sorry these have gotten so long. I’m going to try to find some short subjects in the future, but you’ve got to cover everything sometimes. Thanks for joining me once again, and I look forward to seeing you guys next time on the Subject Matter Minute!

Here is the full episode!