Staff View: Mystery calling : a qualitative application of the Lean Six Sigma approach

Mystery calling : a qualitative application of the Lean Six Sigma approach

Service quality over the telephone is increasingly becoming a critical competitive factor to an organization’s success. A previous study (Latifah A.L et al 2009) conducted in OUM found that learners rated the following two items “university staff is easily contacted by telephone” and “toll free...

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Main Authors:	Latifah Abdol Latif,, Ramli Bahroom,, Fard, Pooyan Yousefi
Format:	Article
Published:	2010
Subjects:	HD28 Management. Industrial Management LB2300 Higher Education
Online Access:	http://library.oum.edu.my/repository/430/1/Fard-Mystery.pdf http://library.oum.edu.my/repository/430/
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id	my.oum.430
record_format	eprints
spelling	my.oum.4302013-05-17T06:50:11Z Mystery calling : a qualitative application of the Lean Six Sigma approach Latifah Abdol Latif, Ramli Bahroom, Fard, Pooyan Yousefi HD28 Management. Industrial Management LB2300 Higher Education Service quality over the telephone is increasingly becoming a critical competitive factor to an organization’s success. A previous study (Latifah A.L et al 2009) conducted in OUM found that learners rated the following two items “university staff is easily contacted by telephone” and “toll free number for learner services center is easily reachable” as least satisfactory. This indicates that OUM’s telephone services need to be improved. To enable improvements to be made, the source of the problem needs to be identified. To achieve this, the Mystery Calling approach is used, whereby a total of 40 calls were made by a mystery caller to OUM staff. The responses from staff were rated based on a set of questions related to friendliness, professionalism, issue resolution, quality of response, and other commonly known problems generally faced by learners in telephone calling. The results are analyzed using the Lean Six Sigma 5-step method, that is, define, measure, analyse, improve and control (DMAIC) to rectify the problems encountered in telephone calling at OUM. The findings suggest that there is no standard procedure in answering telephone calls as evident by the variety of responses. In addition, it is also found that the calls were not attended to in an appropriate and timely manner. There is also a lack of knowledge on the part of the staff in terms of their inability to resolve the issues raised, not providing the relevant information and “passing the buck” to others. Finally, the attitude of the staff was found to be condescending in their dealings with learners. This paper recommends that a standard telephone response procedure be put in place and the relevant training be provided to staff. Recognising that the telephone is an ubiquitous form of communication among distance and widely distributed learners, removing their pain points in this service will immensely contribute to the enrichment of their learning experience at OUM. Finally, this study represents one of the many initiatives at OUM in attempting to improve its services to its learners in line with its learner centredness. (Authors' abstract) 2010 Article PeerReviewed text http://library.oum.edu.my/repository/430/1/Fard-Mystery.pdf Latifah Abdol Latif, and Ramli Bahroom, and Fard, Pooyan Yousefi (2010) Mystery calling : a qualitative application of the Lean Six Sigma approach. E-leader Singapore . pp. 1-9. http://library.oum.edu.my/repository/430/
institution	Open University Malaysia
building	OUM Library
collection	Institutional Repository
continent	Asia
country	Malaysia
content_provider	Open University Malaysia
content_source	OUM Knowledge Repository
url_provider	http://library.oum.edu.my/repository/
topic	HD28 Management. Industrial Management LB2300 Higher Education
spellingShingle	HD28 Management. Industrial Management LB2300 Higher Education Latifah Abdol Latif, Ramli Bahroom, Fard, Pooyan Yousefi Mystery calling : a qualitative application of the Lean Six Sigma approach
description	Service quality over the telephone is increasingly becoming a critical competitive factor to an organization’s success. A previous study (Latifah A.L et al 2009) conducted in OUM found that learners rated the following two items “university staff is easily contacted by telephone” and “toll free number for learner services center is easily reachable” as least satisfactory. This indicates that OUM’s telephone services need to be improved. To enable improvements to be made, the source of the problem needs to be identified. To achieve this, the Mystery Calling approach is used, whereby a total of 40 calls were made by a mystery caller to OUM staff. The responses from staff were rated based on a set of questions related to friendliness, professionalism, issue resolution, quality of response, and other commonly known problems generally faced by learners in telephone calling. The results are analyzed using the Lean Six Sigma 5-step method, that is, define, measure, analyse, improve and control (DMAIC) to rectify the problems encountered in telephone calling at OUM. The findings suggest that there is no standard procedure in answering telephone calls as evident by the variety of responses. In addition, it is also found that the calls were not attended to in an appropriate and timely manner. There is also a lack of knowledge on the part of the staff in terms of their inability to resolve the issues raised, not providing the relevant information and “passing the buck” to others. Finally, the attitude of the staff was found to be condescending in their dealings with learners. This paper recommends that a standard telephone response procedure be put in place and the relevant training be provided to staff. Recognising that the telephone is an ubiquitous form of communication among distance and widely distributed learners, removing their pain points in this service will immensely contribute to the enrichment of their learning experience at OUM. Finally, this study represents one of the many initiatives at OUM in attempting to improve its services to its learners in line with its learner centredness. (Authors' abstract)
format	Article
author	Latifah Abdol Latif, Ramli Bahroom, Fard, Pooyan Yousefi
author_facet	Latifah Abdol Latif, Ramli Bahroom, Fard, Pooyan Yousefi
author_sort	Latifah Abdol Latif,
title	Mystery calling : a qualitative application of the Lean Six Sigma approach
title_short	Mystery calling : a qualitative application of the Lean Six Sigma approach
title_full	Mystery calling : a qualitative application of the Lean Six Sigma approach
title_fullStr	Mystery calling : a qualitative application of the Lean Six Sigma approach
title_full_unstemmed	Mystery calling : a qualitative application of the Lean Six Sigma approach
title_sort	mystery calling : a qualitative application of the lean six sigma approach
publishDate	2010
url	http://library.oum.edu.my/repository/430/1/Fard-Mystery.pdf http://library.oum.edu.my/repository/430/
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score	13.211869

Mystery calling : a qualitative application of the Lean Six Sigma approach

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