...Individual Project #4 Quality Management and Continuous Improvement Control & Six Sigma James Hawthorne American InterContinental University April 14, 2013 Abstract This paper looks at the process mapping for the new check-in and check-out procedures, along with the new procedure for offering fresh towels and linens for guests. The cost savings and improved customer satisfaction is presented, as well as the redirection of labor costs in some unexpected areas. The team of DYKOM does make a recommendation at the end to the management team on what it will take to fully integrate the new method and process mapping. Introduction: The staff at DYKOM would like to thank the management team at Hotel Escargo for opening up the entire hotel operations window, and allowing DYKOM to observe and critique the hidden logistics of what it takes to provide Hotel Escargo’s level of customer satisfaction at the front desk for checking-in and checking-out valued guests, and also for the way it handles additional linen and towel requests. In previous meetings between DYKOM and Hotel Escargo the need to change the process of checking guests in and out has been discussed and the redesign approved. The DYKOM team has provided flow charts for the improved operations in an effort to expedite guests to their rooms to relax and begin recreating. However, DYKOM has received a few correspondences from the hotel management team wanting a more detailed, but simplified breakdown of...
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...Introduction We as humans are complex creatures. This complexity involves every facet of our lives including our thoughts, feelings, and emotions. It is inevitable at some point in time, someone will breakdown and cry at work. The reason for this could be a mixture of situations happening in an individual’s life that has become beyond the point of them being able to handle the pressure at any given moment. The question to ponder is: Is it Okay to Cry at Work? Ineffective Management of Emotions I think that organizations need to be mindful of the way their employees are feeling considering that some of an employee’s emotional stress or pain could be a direct result of their working environment. I think that it is the responsibility to ensure that employee’s emotions are managed in a meaningful and positive way. However, I also believe that there are many factors that hinder an organizations ability to manage emotions effectively. It is without a doubt people want to be successful in their jobs. They want to be looked at as strong, knowledgeable, analytical, highly skilled, and able to perform under pressure. It could be presumed that if a person is emotional in their work environment it will be perceived that they are weak, instable, and not desirable (Munchinsky 2000). Another possible explanation for organizations inability to manage emotions effectively is the leaders of the organization may not have a full understanding of the concept of mood and emotions. ...
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...Chapter 1: Introduction 1. Total Quality Management / TQM: Total Quality Management is an integrative philosophy of management for continuously improving the quality of products and processes. TQM is based on the premise that the quality of products and processes is the responsibility of everyone involved with the creation or consumption of the products or services offered by an organization, requiring the involvement of management, workforce, suppliers, and customers, to meet or exceed customer expectations. Total Quality Management is formally defined as management philosophy and company practices that aim to harness the human and material resources of an organization in the most effective way to achieve the objectives of the organization. Total quality management can be summarized as a management system for a customer-focused organization that involves all employees in continual improvement. It uses strategy, data, and effective communications to integrate the quality discipline into the culture and activities of the organization. 1.2 Background of TQM: The TQM concept was developed based on the teachings of American management consultants, including W. Edwards Deming, Joseph M. Juran, and Armand V. Feigenbaum.[4]Originally, these consultants had short-term success in the United States. Managers in Japan, however, embraced their ideas enthusiastically and even named their premier annual prize for manufacturing excellence after Dr. Deming. Based on Statisticial...
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...research study improving customer satisfaction Roxie Carter Res/351 June 30, 2014 Bob Strong This case study involves development and evolution of a customer satisfaction measurement program at Browning Ferris Inc. BFI became a primary supplier in the North American solid waste industry. The observation for customer satisfaction became relevant when William Ruckelshaus was hired as the new CEO of BFI. William immediately recognize a need to improve customer focus relationship within the organization. He began implementing a plan to collect data to review details about customer quality. Identify the research problem William Ruckelsahaus realize there was an area of opportunity for BFI to increase their customer satisfaction rates. William started addressing the problem and hired the author of this case study who has worked as a technical consultant for the company to gather resourceful information. The employee utilized several key components to observe what challenges arouse and why customers felt dissatisfied with BFI services. He began first reviewing reports within the company. He research involved attending staff meeting, analyzing internal data, and interviewing corporate officers. The responses provided from each party answered the following questions. How and where does focus on customer satisfaction begin in an organization? What roles does measurement play in a customer satisfaction program? What is needed to implement customer satisfaction? How does a...
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...of the common main markets in around the entire world work and efforts regarding customer satisfaction should be on the collection of best practices and the preparation of guidelines for questionnaires to measure customer satisfaction. Customer satisfaction has therefore become the key operational goal for many organizations. They have invested heavily in improving performance in areas that make a strong contribution to customer satisfaction, such as quality and customer service. The customer satisfaction index measures the quality of the goods and services as experienced by the customers that use them. An individual companies’ CSI represents its served markets and its customers’ overall evaluation of total purchase and user experience. Similarly, an industry CSI represents the industry’s customers’ overall evaluation of its market. A sector CSI is an overall evaluation of that sector, and the national CSI gauges the national total consumption experience Customer satisfaction Index (CSI) represents a new type of customer-based measurement system for evaluating and enhancing the performance of companies, industries, economic sectors and national economics. It is designed to be representative of the economy as a whole and covers many companies over various types of industries in the consumer sectors of the economy. On an annual basis the CSI system estimates a company level customer satisfaction index for each company in the sample and weights their company-level indices to calculate...
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...Ohenedwira Thomas, 12021639 Dorothy Dede Aklerh Asamoah, 12021634 Sampson Abbey Armah, 12021630 Arthur Sherifa, 12021631 Amadu Waliu, 12021617 Report Summary 1. Executive Summary DrainFlow, a plumbing maintenance firm in the USA, has been losing its customers to competitors due to poor services. Job motivation and satisfaction among employees is declining across various job categories within the firm. This dissatisfaction has been attributed to the overspecialization of some job functions in the company. The report attempts to assist DrainFlow improve in three key areas: job structure and design, incentive policies, and recruitment practices. It will go further to analyze the causes of the woes being faced by DrainFlow and provide a constructive recommendation on how to overcome them The main contents include an introduction to the problems DrainFlow is encountering, analyses of the current business, and recommendations on how DrainFlow can overcome these issues to foster a long-term competitive advantage. 2. Introduction Research shows that a happy worker is a productive employee. Satisfied employees tend to be better at their workplaces. Many of the individual behaviors at the workplace are affected by job satisfaction The main contents include an introduction to the problems DrainFlow is encountering, analyses of the current business, and recommendations on how DrainFlow can overcome these issues to foster a long-term competitive advantage. The goal of this proposal...
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...How to Measure Customer Satisfaction Murali Chemuturi Introduction Project-based organizations place a lot of emphasis on customer satisfaction, and rightly so, as customer satisfaction is the key for improving these companies’ internal processes. A customer satisfaction rating (CSR) is often obtained through a questionnaire—the customer satisfaction survey (CSS). This method, however, suffers from the drawback of customers likely being emotionally influenced while filling out these questionnaires. Naomi Karten, an expert on the subject of customer satisfaction (www.nkarten.com), states in her seminar Tales of Whoa and the Psychology of Customer Satisfaction: “People tend to rate service higher when delivered by people they like than by people they don’t like.” Karten also goes on to describe what one can do to be “likable.” More often than not, Karten contends, the CSS rating received from the customer represents perceived feedback rather than impartial feedback. This is not to say that companies do not get any value from customer-filled CSR forms. But they must recognize that responses can be emotionally based, and that the customer is not one person, but an organization—meaning multiple people. While so, only one person represents the organization and fills out the survey. Would this person consult all concerned before filling it out? Ideally, he or she should, but often, he or she will not. This gives rise to the need for a way to compute a CSR based on internal data—data...
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...Best Practices for Measuring Customer Satisfaction Dana Atchley Keller Graduate School Introduction There are several means for measuring customer satisfaction including surveys, focus groups, complaints analysis and user groups. Research of top companies around the world seems to suggest that the customer survey method is used more often than any other. There can be problems with data collection and analysis from surveys but technology is improving the measurement of data (Oakland, Beardmore, 1995). We now have computer software to take data, analyze and distribute results. This may be more accurate in reporting the statistics reducing human error, but the survey has to be correctly designed to ensure that data is not tarnished (Fogli, 2006). Measurement Methods The most popular method of measuring customer satisfaction is the survey. Most companies will use independent marketing firms to design and implement surveys that are customized to their industry. These companies can use postal questionnaires and telephone poles to collect data. Usually these questionnaires consist of around fifty questions rating the service on the five point Likert scale (Oakland, Beardmore, 1995). They focus around ordering, delivery, installation and their criteria for excellent suppliers. Telephone surveys are similar in the questions asked but added some different elements concerning competitors. These surveys not only expressed what the organizations are doing well, but...
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...Measuring Customer Satisfaction Customer satisfaction is perhaps one of the most talked about challenges of organizations in the public and private sectors. Indeed, this represents every organization’s sole purpose, and is at the heart of every organizations mission statement. It is seen as a key differentiator and increasingly has become a key element of business strategy. Customer satisfaction is tied directly to profitability. “Customer wants and needs drive competitive advantage, and statistics show that growth in market share is strongly correlated with customer satisfaction.”(Evans, 2010). If your customers are happy, they tend to be loyal. And if they’re loyal they not only buy more, they refer other customers. It is critical to give customers the opportunity to provide feedback about their overall satisfaction level and specific likes and dislikes. A company will lose business, miss growth opportunities, and put itself at a competitive disadvantage without an effective customer satisfaction research program in place. Therefore, it is very important to the success of the business to know right away if they are doing something that frustrates or dissatisfies the customers. According to Evans & Lindsey (2009) in Managing Quality, “To create satisfied customers, the organization needs to identify customers’ needs, design the production and service systems to meet those needs, and measure the results as the basis for improvement” (pg. 190). A customer satisfaction program...
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...investigate the application of measuring customer satisfaction and to demonstrate how colleges and university can enhance their existing processes for measuring the student satisfaction of their service provision. The basic goal of customer satisfaction measurement is objective quantification of subjective perception of consumers. The findings of customer satisfaction study can provide information on how to retain existing customers and attract new one. Customer satisfaction is tied directly to profitability. If your customers are happy, they tend to be loyal. And if they’re loyal they not only buy more, they refer other customers. Well-established research by Bain & Company found that, for many companies, an increase of 5% in customer retention can increase profits by 25% to 95%. The same study found that it costs six to seven times more to gain a new customer than to keep an existing one. Customer satisfaction is the state of mind that customers have about a company when their expectations have been met or exceeded over the lifetime of the product or service. The achievement of customer satisfaction leads to company loyalty and product repurchase. Identification of Best Practices Today, competition is fierce, and customers have more options than ever -- a tough combination for smaller companies trying to gain market share. The Net Promoter score is identified as one of the best practices when it comes to measuring customer satisfaction. According to (Brown 2010), the...
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...Measuring Customer Satisfaction Week 3: Paper Submitted by: Rich De Guzman rich.deguzman32@gmail.com BSOP 588: Managing Quality Instructor: Richard Sheng September 22, 2013 Introduction Being able to provide the best customer satisfaction should be the basis for a company and their vision to succeed. Good customer satisfaction can result in confidence in the company’s products and services however; great customer satisfaction can result in more and new sales or volume. Many companies use different metrics and methods to measure customer satisfaction. This paper will explore a few measures that I have researched and how it correlates to my company or company I used to work for in addition to some recommendations. Identification of best practices One of the most commonly used methods to measure customer satisfaction is by conducting a survey. According to TechRupublic, a survey “allows you to quantify the subjective perceptions of the clients by asking them to convert their perceptions into a numerical rating. The ratings then help the project team better understand how they performed” (TechRadar, 2007). I agree in that surveys do a good job of gathering information so that companies can gain knowledge on how to act and improve their overall customer satisfaction. There are many survey methods out there such as internal and external surveys. This can be deployed in a wide range such as a multiple choice or short answer structure. Many I have seen are surveys...
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...The Importance of Customer Loyalty [Name of Student] [Institution’s Name] The Importance of Customer Loyalty Introduction Creating and retaining loyal customers is significant to the profitability of any business. Every supplier wants to maximize his profitability by creating and retaining potential customers. This assignment strives to understand the importance of customer loyalty in technology management. Discussion Customer loyalty can be reflected through measuring the management’s success in creating and retaining long term interaction with customers. Customer loyalty is significant to running a profitable business. However, this loyalty may be company specific or product specific. For this purpose, I researched a famous social networking website, facebook. Facebook’s management is able to efficiently create and retain its potential users. Facebook enhanced its brand loyalty by continuous improvement in the features and layout of the web page. Therefore, it is still drawing more and more potential customers, even today. Customer Loyalty is Linked to Competitive Advantage Loyal customers need to be targeted by a company’s thoroughly advocated retention program; as such customers tend to give more loyalty to the company. The company’s retention program may include interactive sessions with the customers by regularly communicating them the ideas to contribute towards the enhancement of the products. This opportunity will enhance customer loyalty, which...
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...CUSTOMERS The One Number You Need to Grow by Frederick F. Reichheld FROM THE DECEMBER 2003 ISSUE T he CEOs in the room knew all about the power of loyalty. They had already transformed their companies into industry leaders, largely by building intensely loyal relationships with customers and employees. Now the chief executives—from Vanguard, Chick-fil-A, State Farm, and a half-dozen other leading companies—had gathered at a daylong forum to swap insights that would help them further enhance their loyalty efforts. And what they were hearing from Andy Taylor, the CEO of Enterprise Rent-A-Car, was riveting. Taylor and his senior team had figured out a way to measure and manage customer loyalty without the complexity of traditional customer surveys. Every month, Enterprise polled its customers using just two simple questions, one about the quality of their rental experience and the other about the likelihood that they would rent from the company again. Because the process was so simple, it was fast. That allowed the company to publish ranked results for its 5,000 U.S. branches within days, giving the offices real-time feedback on how they were doing and the opportunity to learn from successful peers. The survey was different in another important way. In ranking the branches, the company counted only the customers who gave the experience the highest possible rating. That narrow focus on enthusiastic customers surprised the CEOs in the room. Hands shot up. What about the rest...
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...Linking Customer and Employee Satisfaction to the Bottom Line Also Available from ASQ Quality Press: Analysis of Customer Satisfaction Data Derek R. Allen and Tanniru R. Rao Customer Centered Six Sigma: Linking Customers, Process Improvement, and Financial Results Earl Naumann and Steven H. Hoisington Customer Satisfaction Measurement Simplified: A Step-by-Step Guide for ISO 9001:2000 Certification Terry G. Vavra Improving Your Measurement of Customer Satisfaction: A Guide to Creating, Conducting, Analyzing, and Reporting Customer Satisfaction Measurement Programs Terry G. Vavra Measuring Customer Satisfaction: Survey Design, Use, and Statistical Analysis Methods, Second Edition Bob E. Hayes The Trust Imperative: Performance Improvement through Productive Relationships Stephen Hacker and Marsha Willard Customer Satisfaction Measurement and Management Earl Naumann and Kathleen Giel Performance Measurement Explained: Designing and Implementing Your State-of-the-Art System Bjørn Andersen and Tom Fagerhaug Value Leadership: Winning Competitive Advantage in the Information Age Michael C. Harris To request a complimentary catalog of ASQ Quality Press publications, call 800-248-1946, or visit our Web site at http://qualitypress.asq.org . Linking Customer and Employee Satisfaction to the Bottom Line A Comprehensive Guide to Establishing the Impact of Customer and Employee Satisfaction on Critical Business Outcomes Derek R. Allen and Morris...
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...Measurement of Customer Satisfaction Level Of consumer Product Assignment On: Measurement of Customer Satisfaction Level Of consumer Product Pre Pared For: Salma Sultana Course Teacher of Marketing Pre Pared By: Group: Marketing 2ed Year Batch: 10th Name: Saydur Rahman Sourav ID: 301138 Submission Date: 3.04.2013 Siddheswari University College Date: 3 February, 2013. The Course Teacher Salma Sultana Subject: Application for submission of assignment on Tram Paper in Marketing Dear Sir I beg to state that, I am a student of 2ed year in group-Marketing in Siddheswari University College. I am submission of an assignment on Tram Paper. The assignment topic is Measurement of Customer Satisfaction Level Of consumer Product. So therefore pray and hope that you have received my assignment & any inquire please let us known. Sincerely Your obediently students 2ed Year Group-B ----------------------------- Saydur Rahman Sourav ABSTRACT Service quality and customer satisfaction are very important concepts that companies must understand if they want to remain competitive and grow. In today’s competitive environment delivering high quality service is the key for a sustainable competitive advantage. Customer satisfaction does have a positive effect on an organization’s profitability. Satisfied customers form the foundation of any successful...
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