To: Dr. Erika Paterson, ENGL 301 99A Instructor
From: Aleem Tariq, ENGL 301 99A Student
Date: October 14th, 2020
Subject: Proposal for the benefits of digitization at Harvest Project
Introduction
Harvest Project is a community-based urban relief organization and registered Canadian charity. Their mission statement is to ‘extend a hand up’ to those in need, providing vital assistance to families and person’s across the North Shore. They do so with tremendous dedication, offering one-to-one client-coaching and active-listening, a rent bank, a grocery-support program, clothing supports, assistance for workforce re-entry, food-recovery and redistribution, and clothing via a retail boutique. Increasing digitization is a common trend in our modern world and generally underutilized in most organizations at present. Potential optimal use of digitization can help Harvest Project in providing vital resources to individuals and families, as the organization would have more information to work with, in the context of decision-making.
Statement of Problem
Having worked in grocery, Harvest Project uses paper surveys for clients to comment on their grocery experience. However, these surveys lacked questions addressing whether the client had found all the items they were looking for and whether or not the client felt they had sufficient selection variety on the types of foods and goods. Also, when in delivery, there was no means of keeping track of what types of goods the organization would be most likely to receive from different stores/food chains.
A potential consequence of this is that Harvest Project is missing out on the potential for rank-ordering what may be the best places to collect from during delivery, given the needs of the clients. Given the time-sensitive nature of delivery, as often being done before grocery services, having this information could prove vital. Although there certainly was an emphasis on the type of goods that were needed and that one should donate, I think there is a tremendous opportunity for optimization that is being missed out on.
Proposed Solution
A possible solution would be to incorporate online questionnaires to be taken by clients, as well as questionnaires to be taken by delivery staff. The former would provide vital information on what goods are in greatest demand, while the latter would be informative for letting the organization know what types of goods are donated by different stores/food chains. Based on the nature of the data collection, the benefit would accrue over time. Harvest Project would have a good grasp of how demand and supply of goods change seasonally, and which deliveries from which stores will need to be prioritized based on the demand. Also, when looking for sources of donation or even having donation drives, this data can help inform what stores the organization needs to look at and what goods will need to be emphasized as being needed.
Scope
To determine the effectiveness of my proposed solution, I need to address several questions, largely pertaining to whether this is truly a problem that needs to be addressed. There are times where the cost of fixing a perceived problem is greater than the negligible cost of leaving a system as it is.
- What is the cost to the charity for not addressing this issue?
- Are there existing systems in place that handle this, and if so, how?
- How much time will be saved concerning deliveries?
- How meaningful will the data truly be to the organization?
- Why hasn’t the system been changed?
Methods
My primary data sources will include surveys of lead team members in various roles in Harvest Project, in particular, those involved with database management. These surveys will allow me to address my scope with precision. I will also attempt to have surveys written by clients and grocery/delivery workers, to get an example of the sort of data I would be working with.
Qualifications
I am a Bachelor of Science graduate from the University of British Columbia, and now in the Computer Science program at the same University. I volunteered with Harvest Project for a year and a half in grocery and delivery roles, interacting with both clients, managers, and fellow volunteers.
Intended Audience
The report will be intended for whoever handles data management and communications, as they would have the authority to approve this feature being created.
Conclusion
There is no doubt in my mind that taking advantage of digitization will provide Harvest Project with an excellent new feature that can go a long way towards furthering their mission statement. They will be better able to provide vital resources to families and individuals on the North Shore, as Harvest Project will not only be able to better project and visualize demands as they change by season, but also the supply of goods from one source to another, and use demand to inform charity drives.
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