Service Quality Management & Measurement

Objectives

Service Quality an overview Understanding Quality Management Measuring Service Quality

Components of Quality: Manufacturing-based

Performance: Primary operating characteristics Features: Secondary Operating Characteristics Reliability: Probability of malfunction or failure Conformance: Ability to meet specifications Durability: How long product continues to provide value to customer Serviceability: Speed, courtesy, competence Esthetics: How product appeals to users Perceived Quality: Associations such as brand name

Components of Quality: Service-based

Responsiveness: helpfulness

Promptness;

Assurance: Competence, courtesy, credibility & security

Responsiveness

Tangibles: Appearance of physical elements

Reliability: Dependable and accurate performance Empathy: Easy access, good communication, understanding of customer

Reliability

Assurance

RATER

Empathy

Tangibles

Examples

Car Rentals Air Journey Hair Saloon Landscaping

Service Quality Management

Christian Gronroos Model Gap Analysis Model

Christian Gronroos Model

The Perceived Service Quality Model Source: Gronroos, C. (1991). Quality Comes to Service, in The Service Quality Handbook.

Technical & Functional Quality

Technical Quality. This includes the systems and infrastructure designed and created to organize delivery of the service. For example: computerized systems, machines technical solutions, and know-how. Functional Quality. The hospitality customer goes through many interactions with employees in the creation and delivery of a hospitality experience. A successful meeting is the result of all functional areas of a hotel being synchronized and focused on creating a beautiful symphony. Technical quality must be in place to facilitate such coordination and allow the employees to work together. Functional quality includes employee: attitudes, behavior, service mindedness, appearance, accessibility internal relations and customer contacts.

Gap Analysis Model

Customer needs and expectations 1. Knowledge Gap Management definition of these needs 2. Standards Gap Translation into design/delivery specs 3. Delivery Gap Execution of design/delivery specs 5. Perceptions Gap Customer perceptions of service execution 7. Service Gap Customer experience relative to expectations 4.

CUSTOMER MANAGEMENT

4. Internal Communications Gap

Advertising and sales promises 6. Interpretation Gap Customer interpretation of communications

Prescriptions for Closing the Service Quality Gaps

1.

Knowledge gap: Learn what customers expect Understand customer expectations Improve communication between frontline staff and management Turn information and insights into action Standards gap: Specify SQ standards that reflect expectations Set, communicate, and reinforce customer-oriented service standards for all work units Measure performance and provide regular feedback Reward managers and employees

2.

Prescriptions for Closing the Service Quality Gaps

3.

Delivery gap: Ensure service performance meets standards Clarify employee roles Train employees in priority setting and time management Eliminate role conflict among employees Develop good reward system Internal communications gap: Ensure that communications promises are realistic Seek comments from frontline employees and operations personnel about proposed advertising campaigns Get sales staff to involve operations staff in meetings with customers Ensure that communications sets realistic customer expectations

4.

Prescriptions for Closing the Service Quality Gaps

5.

Perceptions gap: Educate customers to see reality of service quality delivered Keep customers informed during service delivery and debrief after delivery Provide physical evidence

6.

Interpretation gap: Pretest communications to make sure message is clear and unambiguous Present communication materials to a sample of customers in advance of publication
Service gap: Close gaps 1 to 6 to meet customer expectations consistently

7.

Measuring and Improving Service Quality

Soft and Hard Measures of Service Quality

Soft measuresnot easily observed, must be collected by talking to customers, employees, or others Provide direction, guidance, and feedback to employees on ways to achieve customer satisfaction Can be quantified by measuring customer perceptions and beliefs For example: SERVQUAL, surveys, and customer advisory panels Hard measurescan be counted, timed, or measured through audits Typically operational processes or outcomes Standards often set with reference to percentage of occasions on which a particular measure is achieved Control charts are useful for displaying performance over time against specific quality standards

Soft Measures of Service Quality

Key customer-centric SQ measures include:

Total market surveys, annual surveys, transactional surveys Service feedback cards Mystery shopping Analysis of unsolicited feedbackcomplaints and compliments, focus group discussions, and service reviews

Ongoing surveys of account holders to determine satisfaction in terms of broader relationship issues Customer advisory panels offer feedback/advice on performance

Hard Measures of Service Quality

Control charts to monitor a single variable

Offer a simple method of displaying performance over time against specific quality standards Are only good if data on which they are based is accurate Enable easy identification of trends

Service quality indexes

Embrace key activities that have an impact on customers

Composition of FedExs Service Quality IndexSQI

Failure Type
Weighting Factor
1 5 1 5 1 1 10 10 10 5 5 1

Number of Daily = Incidents Points

Late deliveryright day Late Deliverywrong day Tracing request unanswered Complaints reopened Missing proofs of delivery Invoice adjustments Missed pickups Lost packages Damaged packages Aircraft delays (minutes) Overcharged (packages missing label) Abandoned calls

Total Failure Points (SQI) =

XXX,XXX

Control Chart for Departure Delays

15 Minutes of Schedule

% Flights Departing Within

100%
90% 80% 70% 60%
J F M A M J J A S O N D

Month

Tools to Analyze and Address Service Quality Problems

Fishbone diagram

Cause-and-effect diagram to identify potential causes of problems

Pareto Chart

Separating the trivial from the important. Often, a majority of problems is caused by a minority of causes (i.e. the 80/20 rule)

Blueprinting

Visualization of service delivery, identifying points where failures are most likely to occur

Cause-and-Effect Chart for Flight Departure Delays

Facilities, Equipment
Arrive late Oversized bags

Frontstage Front-Stage Personnel Personnel

Procedures Procedures

Customers Customers

Delayed check-in Aircraft late to Gate agents procedure gate cannot process Mechanical fast enough Acceptance of late Failures passengers Late/unavailable airline crew Late pushback

Delayed Departures Other Causes

Weather Air traffic Late food service Late baggage Late fuel
Materials, Materials, Supplies Supplies

Late cabin cleaners

Poor announcement of departures Weight and balance sheet late

Backstage Personnel

Information

Blueprinting

Depicts sequence of front-stage interactions experienced by customers plus supporting backstage activities

Used to identify potential fall pointswhere failures are most likely to appear
Shows how failures at one point may have a ripple effect later Managers can identify points which need urgent attention

Important first step in preventing service quality problems