The formation of a continuous improvement process for customer services: A case study

This is a case study utilizing the Participant-Observer mode of research. The basic research question of this study was "How did the formation of a continuous improvement process for customer services evolve, and what changes did its implementation have on customer service and the culture of Telco, Inc., Operator Information Services in one Southwestern state?"; Telco, Inc. had set as a goal the re-engineering of processes through process management in order to improve the quality of products and services it provides to its customers. This goal was initiated by upper level management to achieve a competitive edge in an increasingly competitive telecommunications market. One of the major implementation strategies was the use of continuous improvement techniques to improve processes.; The forming of a continuous improvement process to manage the quality of services provided to the customers of Operator Information Services has been the subject of this case study. The study was conducted for a period of eighteen months utilizing the Plan, Do, Check, Act (Shewhart cycle) theory of continuous improvement as the framework of the study. The key elements of the Plan, Do, Check, Act cycle were utilized to test the validity of multiple sources of data. The results of the study indicate that a continuous improvement process was formed, and that the formed process demonstrated the potential power of incorporating feedback from the process itself and from the customer to change the process inputs, before the outcomes are produced.