Peer- Graded Assignment

Challenge      I am a Management Consultant and help clients in improving their business processes. While

working with one of my client, who was dealing with high value industrial products, there was an  issue identified with the ‘Customer Service’. Customers complained of delays in resolution of their  issues, running beyond the company’s committed turnaround time and on the other hand the  service team felt that they were able to resolve customer complaints as per the company’s  committed turnaround time. The service team even showed the complaint log to confirm the same.  The client was not able to understand this dichotomy and while they were willing to increase the  number of service engineers to improve customer service, they also felt that it may not solve the  problem as the existing service engineers were not fully utilized.    Selection       To understand this problem, I used the ‘Visualization’ tool as it helps to achieve a common

understanding of the problem amongst all the different stakeholders involved, before attempting to  identify different possible solutions to the problem.

Application      I decided to first understand the customer complaint and resolution process. For this I

conducted interviews with different stakeholders like customers, service head, service engineers and  sales engineers. After understanding the customer complaint and resolution process, next step was  to create a ‘Process Map’ or a visual representation of the process along with all the different  stakeholders sitting together in one room. Once the process map was created using visio, everybody  got the same view of the problem and started understanding the perspective of the other  stakeholders.    Insight & Approach      It came to light that the customer would inform the sales engineer, who had sold them the

product and not the customer service team directly. This was happening due to lack of awareness  about the company’s customer service contact coordinates. The sales engineer would draft a mail  and send the customer and complaint details to the customer service team. Whenever the sales  engineer was in office he could mail the details immediately, but when he was in the field, he would  send the mail only towards the end of the day. The service team would see the mail on next working  day and enter that time as time of receipt of complaint, whereas the customer would start  calculating the time from the instance that he had informed the sales engineer about the issue. So  while the service team was able to resolve the complaint within the committed turnaround time,  from the time of their receipt of complaint, for the customer the resolution time was in many cases  higher by upto a day.  Creation of the process map with time taken for each activity immediately  helped the client team understand the dichotomy and the different perspective of the customer and  the customer service team on the same issue.      The team then started looking at ways to increase awareness about the company’s customer

service contact coordinates and encourage customers to approach the customer service team  directly and not through the sales engineer. When contacted by the customer for complaints, the  sales engineers also started asking customers to log a complaint with the customer service team

directly. Sales engineers would help the customers with the contact coordinates of the customer  service team, in case the customer did not have them.       The ‘Design Thinking’ course has made me see the Visualization and other tools in a new

light. While I have used some of these tools before, now I can use them systematically, at the right  time and for the appropriate situation. I found the Visualization tool particularly appealing as it  brings all the stakeholders on the same page and helps them come up with a solution addressing the  concerns of all the stakeholders instead of them identifying the solution for their individual  perspective which might not necessarily be the best possible solution.


Peer- Graded Assignment Challenge I am a Management Consultant and help clients in improving their business processes . While working with one of my client , who was dealing with high value industrial products , there was an issue identified with the ‘ Customer Service ’ . Customers complained of delays in resolution of their issues , running beyond the company ’s committed turnaround time and on the other hand the service team felt that they were able to resolve customer complaints as per the company ’s committed turnaround time . The service team even showed the complaint log to confirm the same . The client was not able to understand this dichotomy and while they were willing to increase the number of service engineers to improve customer service , they also felt that it may not solve the problem as the existing service engineers were not fully utilized . Selection To understand this problem , I used the ‘ Visualization ’ tool as it helps to achieve a common understanding of the problem amongst all the different stakeholders involved , before attempting to identify different possible solutions to the problem . Application I decided to first understand the customer complaint and resolution process . For this I conducted interviews with different stakeholders like customers , service head , service engineers and sales engineers . After understanding the customer complaint and resolution process , next step was to create a ‘ Process Map ’ or a visual representation of the process along with all the different stakeholders sitting together in one room . Once the process map was created using visio , everybody got the same view of the problem and started understanding the perspective of the other stakeholders . Insight & Approach It came to light that the customer would inform the sales engineer , who had sold them the product and not the customer service team directly . This was happening due to lack of awareness about the company ’s customer service contact coordinates . The sales engineer would draft a mail and send the customer and complaint details to the customer service team . Whenever the sales engineer was in office he could mail the details immediately , but when he was in the field , he would send the mail only towards the end of the day . The service team would see the mail on next working day and enter that time as time of receipt of complaint , whereas the customer would start calculating the time from the instance that he had informed the sales engineer about the issue . So while the service team was able to resolve the complaint within the committed turnaround time , from the time of their receipt of complaint , for the customer the resolution time was in many cases higher by upto a day . Creation of the process map with time taken for each activity immediately helped the client team understand the dichotomy and the different perspective of the customer and the customer service team on the same issue . The team then started looking at ways to increase awareness about the company ’s customer service contact coordinates and encourage customers to approach the customer service team directly and not through the sales engineer . When contacted by the customer for complaints , the sales engineers also started asking customers to log a complaint with the customer service team directly . Sales engineers would help the customers with the contact coordinates of the customer service team , in case the customer did not have them . The ‘ Design Thinking ’ course has made me see the Visualization and other tools in a new light . While I have used some of these tools before , now I can use them systematically , at the right time and for the appropriate situation . I found the Visualization tool particularly appealing as it brings all the stakeholders on the same page and helps them come up with a solution addressing the concerns of all the stakeholders instead of them identifying the solution for their individual perspective which might not necessarily be the best possible solution .