Page 11 - West Virgina 811 Magazine 2022 Issue 3

Recommendation – Effective Metrics:
Identify, develop, collect, and track metrics that effectively support trend- ing and continuous improvement of the state damage prevention performance. Solution Summary – The most widely recognized metric is total number of damages per 1000 tickets. This should be further refined to - total number of damages per 1000 transmissions, or out- going tickets. It should be noted that there are several factors in the locate notification process that vary from state to state that make this metric unpredict- able. National standardization of the notification process would potentially transform the industry through the direct result of stable data (see Stan- dardize Ticket Size, Distance, Duration, and Life Recommendation). States that choose not to standardize would re- quire substantial additional analysis in order to develop normalized metrics to support state-to-state and year-to-year analysis. Additional metrics include, but are not limited to:
• # of damages per construction spend or more specifically utility con- struction spend (normalization)
• # of damages per customer served (normalization)
• # of damages per state population (normalization)
• the trending of damages against GDP growth
• the trending of damages against ur- ban density or state average density Solution Reference – North Carolina approach to data requirements, track- ing, and analysis.
Annual Reporting to CGA and DIRT
Tactical / Process Issue Addressed – Tactical: Lack of formal requirement to consistently report state performance data to Common Ground Alliance. Structure a system to support contin- uous improvement efforts through collection of data to identify trends, conduct root cause analysis, and ulti- mately support building a culture that embraces damage prevention.
Recommendation – Annual Reporting to CGA and DIRT: Require state enti- ty(s) responsible for the oversight of the 811 system and collection and adjudica- tion of compliance or damage reports, ticket volumes, etc. to submit data to
the Common Ground Alliance (CGA) in support of the annual DIRT report.
Solution Summary – The Common Ground Alliance (CGA) is established and nationally recognized as the in- dustry standard for continuous im- provement and industry best practices specific to damage prevention. CGA’s focus is solely on damage prevention and the update or development of best management practices along with the publication of the annual DIRT report highlighting state by state damage prevention performance.
Solution Reference – www.com- mongroundalliance.com
Standardize Ticket Size, Distance, Du- ration, and Life on
Tactical / Process Issue Addressed – Tactical: Lack of consistent and ongo- ing improvements to various processes that support a high-functioning damage prevention program.
Recommendation – Standardize Ticket Size, Distance, Duration, and Life:
CONTINUED ON PAGE 15
2022, Issue 3 West Virginia 811 • 9