The Value of Automating CPE

Michelle Walsh

Vice President of Client Services, XCM

Video Transcript

The old process, we really handled it manually, so we handled it by having the manual sign-in sheets. What that meant is prior to the conference, preparing those, so making sure that each classroom had a folder that included that sign-in sheet. It had all the information that was there, and then physically needing a person or several people to be in the room to facilitate that to make sure that it got around the room, that every single person signed in, and then also made sure that they signed out or if a person came in late. Physically, on-site, that was a huge challenge. Also just making sure that in each room that the right folder was in the right room at the right time. As you know, it’s not unusual that we might end up moving a room because we’ll find out [that] this room’s not big enough and this has to happen on the fly, so now that folder is also flying around the conference center. On-site there was a lot of chaos with the CPE process, and then subsequently, when you get back to the office, it’s making sure [that we did] get every one one of those folders? Do we have all of them? Without a doubt, there’s always going to be one or two people that “I forgot to sign in,” or “I didn’t sign in,” or “the sign-in sheet never got to me.” You now have all that follow-up as well that you’re handling. When we get back to the office is really when the real effort came into play because now you had to find a way to consolidate all of these pieces of paper. What we would end up doing is really creating this giant spreadsheet with all of the attendees names and then being able to mark off what session did they attend, did they sign in, did they sign out, did they do an evaluation for that session. The reconciliation of that was just an enormous task. It really required one to two, sometimes even three people to just be heads down working on that. It could take anywhere from a month to maybe a month-and-a-half to get all of that done because once you reconcile it all, you then have to go and actually prepare their certificate. Take that information, transferred it into a certificate. Once the certificate is complete, now you have to find a way to distribute it. We would distribute it by email, but again, doing that 250, 300 times, it’s just an incredibly timely process. For us, Eventur has been a huge help to be able to handle this and to get it done so quickly. For us, a big challenge that we had is that many people would be looking to renew their license just shortly after the conference. We would, without fail, have 10 people that would come to us the very next week and say, “Hey, I need my CPE certificate.” Now you’re doing a separate process for these 10 people because they need them right away. That was a huge effort that went into it. Another challenge that we have around that is that people, without fail, they are going to lose their CPE certificate. We have folks that it’s only every two years that they have to renew their license, so they’ll two years later say, “Hey, I don’t have my certificate for this.” Now we’re digging through and sending files. It may only happen a dozen times, but every time that you do that, it’s just an extra effort that we have to do. Really, having all of this consolidated into the technology, it helps us, one, to just be more efficient on our end and reduce the amount of time on my team, but also it provides a better value to the attendees. Letting them get that right away, they’re happy to see, “Oh, I’ve got it. It’s all set. I don’t have to keep looking for it. I know where it is.” That’s been a huge difference for us.