WEDNESDAY, MAY 23, 2012
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Operations Call Centers

Call Centers

A Six Sigma Case Study-Tutorial for IT Call Center – Part 1

This combination case study and tutorial illustrates Six Sigma use in an IT call center. It tracks a DMAIC project from inception through its five phases. The goal is to make a company more competitive and profitable.

Calculating Call Center Interarrival and Service Times

Two Six Sigma professionals recently posed questions in the iSixSigma Discussion Forum relating to queuing theory in a call center.

Call Center Quality: Satisfaction Over Quantity

At many call centers, the measurement of quality is the number of calls handled per representative, per month. Feedback on individual performance is recorded and a score is computed from this data for use in evaluating each representative’s performance.

Delight Customers: Reduce Defects in Service Delivery

Recently, a VOC survey revealed that operator response at a company was poor and customer satisfaction was low. The resulting improvement efforts serve as an example of how a service process can be turned around using the principles of Six Sigma.

Done in One: The Importance of First-call Resolution

By Laura Edell Gibbons For most contact centers, nearly one-third of inbound calls are repeat callers who weren’t satisfied the first time they called. More often than not, the antiquated switches that contact centers leverage don’t do a great job…

Fixing Between-agent Variation Can Make All the Difference

By Dennis Adsit, Ph.D. Here is the good news: To help their call centers improve, managers need to solve just one problem – between-agent variation. That’s right. Fixing that problem can take a call center to a new standard of…

How Billing Delays Can Correlate with Call Volumes

By taking an unconventional approach to a call center problem, an organizational improvement specialist was able to find correlation between call volumes and bill mailings.

How Do You Improve Call Center Forecast Accuracy with Six Sigma?

In an exchange on the iSixSigma Discussion Forums, a representative from a telecommunications firm was interested in learning about what methods are best to improve forecast accuracy at the company’s call center. After some discussion about defining the goals of…

How to Do Call Volume Forecasting for Service Desks

Setting appropriate staffing levels for a service desk requires a way to forecast call volumes. While there are many forecasting techniques, one that is simple, easy to implement and can be applied to any size service desk is the best place to start.

Reducing Misdirected Calls in Automated Payment Systems

A DMAIC project at a telecommunications firm reveals the root causes behind the problem of having too many customer calls being misdirected from the automated payment system to call center agents.

The Customer Talks Back: Musings on Call Center Efficiency

Speaking from a customer perspective, a Lean Six Sigma manufacturing expert provides reminders about what the critical-to-quality characteristics are for call centers.

The Final Tollgate: Age Verification Cycle Time

This project, completed by online betting organization Betfair, was a finalist in the Largest-breakthrough Improvement Projects for the 2010 iSixSigma Live! Awards.

The Futility of Call Center Coaching

Although it has become an industry standard, one-on-one coaching is less valuable than many believe. Through the use of mathematical modeling, it is possible to see that coaching, even in moderate turnover environments, is a fool’s errand.

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