Authors: SRUJIT KUMAR BIRADAWADA & LAWRENCE OSEI
INTRODUCTION
IT industry is among the fastest growing industry in the world. Competition is growing fiercely when it comes to IT services especially IT call center. Companies that can withstand the competition are those that are offering superior customer services to its customers. The aim of every organization is to generate profit to maximize shareholders wealth. Companies that are not maximizing shareholders wealth need to revamp its operation to stay in business.
Executive summary
The companies renders its services through web or telephone calls.
The data was obtained from a third party company that indicates that the company’s customer satisfaction rate is 73%, average company is 76% and best in class competitor is 87%. This shows that, the company customer satisfaction is low as compared to the industry average. In order to survive in IT call centre, the company should offer superior customer satisfaction.
The data also shows that, support cost for the best company in the marker is $26.00 per call, average company is $30.00 per call and the company’s cost per call is $36.00. This indicates that the company has the highest cost in the industry. In order to attract, retain new customers and increase profit, the company should eliminate waste from its business operations.
The data revealed that the company customer satisfaction is low and also has high support cost in the industry. After identifying the problems as low customer satisfaction and high support cost,I can now apply six sigma DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, and Control) process to solve the problem.
On DMAIC project the ‘Y’ being new account growth and the ‘Xs’ being number of transfers, wait time and service.
Define phase
The goal statement of the company is to increase customer satisfaction from 75% to 85% by the end of 4th quarter without changing support cost.
If the company increase customer satisfaction by 10 percent without reducing support cost. The company can still not be competitive in the market. The higher the support cost, the lower the profit margin and vice versa.
Measure phase
CTQ=F(X1, X2, X3…Xk)
CTQ being customer satisfaction and ‘Xs’ being wait time, and superior service. Improvement phase
These are some of the factors that can be used to improve the IT case;
1. By using new and modern equipment.
2. By using trained and qualified personnel
Data
The data was not from the authentic source and cannot be used to measure the actual performance of the company. The data should have come from the companies own data bank rather than 3rd party.
Tools
Despite the advantages of cause and effect or fish bone diagram over the other tools employed, it has the following flaws; it creates a divergent approach to problem solving, the team expends a great deal of energy speculating about potential causes, many of which have no significant effect on the problem. This approach can leave a team feeling frustrated and hopeless. Secondly, fishbone diagrams typically based on opinion rather than evidence. This enables team to deciding which problems to explore and which one not to explore.
Another tool that was used in the analysis is ANOVA. ANOVA method requires two assumptions to be made. These are; Means from each data group must be (roughly) equal and Variances from each data group must be (roughly) equal. In real world application, this does not exist.
THE FOLLOWING ARE THE TEN CRITERIA USED TO MEASURE THE IT CALL CENTER CASE.
Link to strategic imperatives
I will rank the IT call center strategic imperatives project to be HIGH. This is because the project will improve the customer satisfaction and reduce the call wait time. Improving these two factors will impact on the performance of the company. The project has a very great impact on the key metrics for the organization. It is very important to maintain the grip over strategic drivers of business as it ensures that leadership remains engaged during the long run improvements.
Application of six sigma tools
Tools employed to analyze this project are ANOVA, Fishbone Diagram, Control chart etc. I will rank it HIGH because it has been employed successfully. Despite its successful application, those tools have the following drawbacks.
It creates a divergent approach to problem solving, the team expends a great deal of energy speculating about potential causes, many of which have no significant effect on the problem. This approach can leave a team feeling frustrated and hopeless. Secondly, fishbone diagrams typically based on opinion rather than evidence. This enables team to deciding which problems to explore and which one not to explore.
Another tool that was used in the analysis is ANOVA. ANOVA method requires two assumptions to be made. These are: Means from each data group must be (roughly) equal and Variances from each data group must be (roughly) equal. In real world application, this does not exist.
Active sponsor engagement
There is active sponsor engagement in this project to guide the project to the right direction to achieve major business goals. I will rank it HIGH. There is industry data that progress report need to be compared. This will
serve as checks and balances for the team. The sponsor engagement was really very good as the business results were clear and that tell how actively the sponsor has engaged in the project.
Team Actively engaged
This is LOW. There is no team engagement and the employees are doing their own thing. Employees are not aware of the project and the company’s current situation.
Broad organization awareness of the project
There is little awareness of the project. Only few employees are aware of the project. I will rank it LOW as the plans are invisible to the rest of the organization and there is no formal communication.
Project delivered anticipated results
The project delivered the anticipated results. All the stakeholders are aware of the project changes, results and outcome. I will rank it MEDIUM, because the project did not meet the expectation.
Project Completed on Time
Time of completion was not mentioned but I will rather rank it to be HIGH because the team has set the target and are worked towards the target. Completing the project within the specified time period is a sign for success. Short project duration boost the morale of the team members and long duration projects make team members lose focus.
Successful Transition of Ownership to Process Owner
I will rank it LOW. This is because it was never mentioned in the case.
Improvement Sustained Over Time
This is HIGH as the improvements attained has sustained over the period of time. The results have been sustained over and showed that changes have been adopted by the organization. The performance during the process is far much better as compared to the project start date .The team embraced the changes and the manager was efficient in managing the time and team efficiently.
Replication of results
The team has developed a thorough plan to show how the improvement would be duplicated. Changed management has been put in place for successful continuation of the project in future.