Process Flow Chat for a Service Call in DMI/FSD - Case Study Example

Name Instructor Course Date Process Flow Chat for a Service Call in DMI/FSD Customer Call Taker Dispatcher Technician Customer. After a customer called in to report a problem, the call taker fed the customer’s information on the company’s computer system. The dispatcher on any of the 5 regional dispatch centers’ depending on the location of the customer would then have to wait for an hour to assign to the technician the complains of the customer in regards to the customers problem. The problem found here is that the company had only 24 dispatchers in its 5 regional dispatch centers and this translates to delay, DMI should increase the number of dispatch centers as well as dispatchers to curb this problem (Curtis 1996-1998). Between the dispatcher and the technician, there was a delay in assignment simply because the dispatcher had to select the appropriate technician for job. DMI should train all technicians with the same efficiency in order for any technician to be able to handle any type of job in response to the customer’s needs. In order for a technician to acquire a new order, he ought to call the dispatch centre to report on completion of assigned task. The technicians complain of holding on a call for too long, lack of incentives and in return, many of the technicians do not call back to report. DMI should employ more call takers to minimize the case that the technician is going through and in turn increase efficient service delivery to the customers. The dispatchers should be allowed to directly call the customers to give the client exact timing to when their problems will be dealt with. In order for DMI to solve these problems, the company should consider the use of cellular phones to reach the technicians with ease despite the cost. In addition, the company should consider the following. An expert system for problem diagnosis for technicians while in the field. Employ an expert system for assigning and scheduling technicians. Geographic positioning system to track technicians at all times DMI/FSD should consolidate its regional dispatch into one location and have a substanciable numbers of dispatchers in that one location to cater for all regions. This could be done to minimize the accumulated running costs of each one of all the locations (Curtis 1996-1998). DMI’s service provision is not the best due to a number of several factors ranging from service delivery to its consumers to the problem of having to work with old technology. This proves to be very expensive to maintain when a breakdown occurs since new technology is taking over in everything around. In order to guarantee it customers better services guarantee and maintain its clients and preventing them from choosing for DMI’s competitors as their main service providers, DMI ought to do the following. Employ the right number of manpower needed to handle its daily chores without delays. Train or hire qualified service members for service delivery. Employ new technology to avoid cases of high maintenance costs and breakdowns. DMI/FSD needs to measure field service performance in order to keep record of the company’s progress and its customers perception of it in relation to service delivery. According to some of the managers employed at DMI, the system of performance currently in use should be dealt with and measures should be based on the number of service calls completed on a single day. The company’s strategic issues for the location are; to put up together a reengineering team consisting of a regional manager, a division VP, a call-taker, a dispatcher, an IS person, an accounting person and an outside consultant, all Denver residents, improve on its technology to be able to handle tasks with more ease. There is a shortage of qualified technicians around to handle technical issues. DMI can recruit individuals interested in this field of technology and teach them how to work on these machines. Once the recruits are well versed on how and what to do, the organization can end up employing them to work on there location branches. This way, DMI can become a learning organization. Action Plan for DMI/FSD management An action plan is a chain of events that must be performed well in order for an implemented strategy to succeed. For DMI/FSD to ensure success in its operations, an action plan must be laid down and strictly adhered to facilitate this. The following is my proposed action plan to the organization. Service delivery The typical service time for all service contracts for a particular model was estimated to be four hours, but something happened within the organization and all this changed. In order to provide efficient service delivery to its customers and go back to its four hour estimated time. For efficient service delivery in all locations of the organization, the organization needs to make every firm independent in its own way but have its main base at the capital organization (Curtis1996-1998). Through this, every division employs its own division VP for every location responsible for daily running of the locations programs, regional manager responsible for managing the regions activities of the firm. The firm should employ a call-taker responsible for taking calls for that particular location, dispatcher responsible for dispatching assignments to the locational technicians, technicians responsible for taking care of the customers needs, accountant responsible for the balancing the locations cheques and cash flow. Time Horizon After careful considerations of all the problem generating factors, the organization will then go ahead and make sure that all the responsible personnel are there, train all the technicians if need be. The firm with ease will go back to providing services to the consumers within the estimated time of four hours and there will be a reduction of complaints form the customers about the issue of delays. Resource Allocation In order for every one of these planned activities to be effected, the organization will have to be able to allocate the immediate funds whenever needed by whichever party that will be in need. Field of Business DMI/FSD is a type of business that deals with the manufacture and distribution of a wide variety of electronic, photographic and reprographic equipments used in engineering and medical systems. Due to this, DMI/FSD is an electronic components business. Problems Facing DMI/FSD DMI/FSD used to be a multibillion-dollar company in Denver that manufactured and distributed electronic, photographic and reprographic equipments. A number of problems faced by DMI/FSD that lead to a diminishing streak, some of these problems included; most of the company’s technicians were based in the larger metropolitan areas and through this, attention to the customers from the lesser metropolitan areas was becoming harder and harder with each customer call since the time it took to lay coordination’s between the dispatcher and the technician and the technician and the dispatcher after every assigned task was hard. Also, the limited number of dispatchers, technicians and the distance the technicians had to travel before they a clients place paused another problem. Technology too created another one of the many problems the company faced since technology was and is constantly changing, product variety was continually increasing and components produced by the company were reliable, machines become complicated and sophisticated to repair. As a result, sound technicians became hard to find. With only 40 call-takers and over 3500 calls per day, no way were the call-takers able to handle the daily requirements of the consumers (Curtis 1996-1998). Causes of DMI Problems Uneven distribution of technicians in the larger and lesser metropolitan areas as well as the urban areas, this caused the lack of immediate attention to the customers living in the lesser metropolitan and urban areas. Limited number of call-takers who were supposed to handle calls from more than 3500 daily callers, this caused intendance to all the customers whenever any caller tried to make a call. Limited number of dispatchers who were supposed to be the ones handing technicians assignments on where their next task should be, this caused congestion in workload to the few dispatchers that were available. Technology, constant change in technological handling of machines, this caused complication in repairs and resulted in scarcity of efficient technicians to do those repairs. Solution to DMI/FSD problems DMI/FSD management board should recruit qualified or train more technicians and distribute in them in the lesser metropolitan areas. This will reduce the cases of uneven distribution of technicians. 40 call-takers per every 3500 callers is an uneven proportion for any care-taker in order for the organization to this problem, the company should employ more call-takers and they do not have to be on a full time basis. These call-takers can operate on shifts to cater for the clients needs (Curtis 1996-1998). The organization should also increase the number of dispatchers in order to be able to attend to the technicians immediately there is a problem that needs a technicians attendance. DMI/FSD should employ an expert system for problem diagnosis for technicians while in the field, employ an expert system for assigning and scheduling technicians, geographic positioning system to track technicians at all times in order to curb technological issues. References Curtis L. Carson School of Management, University of Minnesota 1996-1998 Read More