Our Mission

To provide exceptional and cost-effective transportation services that consistently exceed customer expectations while promoting the principles and practices of livable communities and sustainable development.

Core Values

  • Customer Satisfaction
  • Collaboration
  • Diversity
  • Fiscal Accountability
  • Innovation
  • Sustainability
  • Safety

Customer Satisfaction:

The result of an ability to constantly and consistently exceed the expectations of external and internal customers.

Sample Indicators:

  • The organization is worthy of dinner table conversation
  • The organization welcomes complaints as a diagnostic tool and acts on correction
  • The organization incorporates a monitoring system that measures internal and external customer satisfaction
  • The Ridership/Usage goes up
  • Senior Management models the principles of customer satisfaction, behavior and attitude
  • The impact on customers is a major consideration in all decision making
  • Employee hiring, recognition, & promotion is primarily based upon customer satisfaction performance
  • The organization’s leadership & employees look for and find ways to add value to the service provided to the community
  • The community sees value in the services provided by the organization
  • The community supports the mission of the organization

Collaboration:

The process of bringing together knowledge, experience, ideas and skills to achieve a common goal.

Sample Indicators:

  • Interaction among staff members is positive and supportive
  • Projects, problems, proposals, opinion/ideas are routinely worked on as a group effort
  • Leaders, team members and department staff show teamwork among themselves
  • Positive supportive reinforcement is given to others
  • Communications are open and honest and employees feel free to discuss problems and issues in a non-defensive or non-accusatory manner
  • Board and staff interaction is positive and supportive
  • The organization enjoys good working relationships with other local, state, and federal jurisdictions as well as with quasi-public organizations

Diversity:

The appreciation and respect for different characteristics of individuals and groups that make them unique and able to offer different perspectives, skills and talents.

Sample Indicators:

  • Recognize the differences in others for the betterment of the organization
  • Diversity of opinion is welcomed and encouraged by the organization
  • The organization and its people seek opinion from all segments of staff, customer base and community
  • The organization takes proactive measures to recruit, hire, & promote a diverse workforce

Fiscal Accountability:

The commitment and practice of being exemplary stewards of public resources.

Sample Indicators:

  • Actively seek ways to economize, which do not diminish the effectiveness and efficiency of the organization
  • Provide services and reduce costs by establishing partnerships with other organizations
  • Employees are recognized and rewarded for implementing cost saving ideas within the organization
  • The organization’s leadership and employees are all cost conscious and value oriented
  • The organization’s leadership and employees are held accountable for the cost effective use of public resources
  • Fiscal decisions of the organization are made with the goal of future sustainability
  • The organization will provide basic (core) services first; expanded or additional services are only provided when the organization is fiscally able to do so
  • The organization is fiscally sustainable and accountable

Innovation: 

The use of progressive and creative approaches to problem solving and goal accomplishment.

Sample Indicators:

  • The organization prides itself in its ability to change quickly to meet a changing business environment
  • Achievement comes through idea leadership
  • The organization is constantly looking to improve practices, policies and products
  • The organization is flexible and willing to change for the sake of improvement
  • Staff members are encouraged to risk trying something new
  • The organization is constantly on the lookout for a better way and encourages modeling the best ideas, processes and practices
  • The organization shows respect for new ideas
  • The organization encourages the use of benchmarking to improve quality
  • The organization encourages and supports the training and education of its people

Sustainability:

The ability to successfully serve the future needs of the people who live, work and play within the community with available resources.

Sample Indicators:

  • The organization encourages and supports livable communities

  • The organization encourages and supports smart growth
  • The organization encourages and supports alternative transportation modes to the single occupant vehicle (SOV)
  • The organization encourages and supports environmental quality
  • The organization encourages and supports community wide transportation accessibility
  • The organization encourages and supports shared rides

Safety:

The state of being free from the occurrence or risk of injury, danger or loss; a condition of having removed or reduced the potential for harm, injury, danger or loss.

Sample Indicators:

  • A diverse safety committee with broad representation is active and serious about the role it plays in the organization
  • Senior management pays attention to the safety committee and acts on the recommendations it makes
  • Preventable traffic accidents are reduced in number and severity
  • Safety becomes an attitude of constant awareness so that individual accidents are reduced at work, as well as in personal lives
  • The community perceives Ben Franklin Transit and its contractors as a safe mode of transportation
  • Other motorists and local law enforcement know that Ben Franklin Transit drivers respect and put into practice the rules of the road
  • Ben Franklin Transit meets and exceeds safety standards industry wide
  • Employees recognize that safety is a personal responsibility
  • Safety outcomes are monitored, tracked and reviewed in order to improve policies, procedures and training
  • Good safety performance is rewarded within the organization
  • The organization is recognized and rewarded for good safety performance within peer organizations.