Innovations in Work SystemsLaura Flowerree, Suzanne Collins,

Velvet Voelz, Christopher Serio

March 10, 2009

BackgroundGuildQuality was founded in 2002Founder and President saw market need for

customer satisfaction surveying while working for a real estate developer in Charleston, SC

Company gathers and stores customer satisfaction surveys for builders, remodelers, and developers nationwide

By 2007 GuildQuality had over 500 members in 46 states

How It Works for Members

Portion of Sample Survey

Survey consists of 25 questions Answers scored

on a 0 to 4 scale

Homeowner able to make

comments throughout

survey

The Call Center Builders enter homeowner contact information into an online

database Survey Managers access database and assess how many surveys

need to be done in a given week and divide up the list according to employee work schedules

Phone surveyors access database to make calls and record answers or make a note that they need to call back

Survey Managers randomly listen in to phone conversations between the surveyor and homeowner for quality control purposes

The surveyors try to reach the homeowner 10 times by phone before the survey is retired

Once the survey is completed, the data is stored in a database and can be accessed by the members (builders, remodelers, and real estate developers)

Issues Policy Issues:

What to do if a builder wants you to contact a specific homeowner (for example, contacting the wife only since she had a better experience with the builder)

Ethical issues: How far do you stretch policies What if employees steal and sell data What to do if a homeowner wants to change a survey

response Security:

How do you create security so that data is protected Incentives:

How to structure incentives and pay scale Should GuildQuality outsource surveying all together

Analysis and Possibilities

GuildQuality’s call center has several weaknesses that have led to lower performance in the past

Lessened the quality of the information collected in surveys

Lowers the company’s overall effectiveness and quality of core competencies

Analysis and Possibilities

Examined 4 possible solutions:Developing a Structured Training Program &

Hiring ProtocolCreating a Best Practice Methodology Investing in Call Center TechnologyOutsourcing the Call Center

Recommendations & Justifications

Outsource the call centerCall center management proven to not be a

core competency IT has revolutionized the industryMultiple technology vendors makes supporting

and maintaining the system difficultContract with a supplier that specializes in

online virtual operationsBrick-and-mortar centers are more limitingVirtual centers can be customized

Recommendations & Justifications

Ideal company – LiveOps (Palo Alto, CA)Fully integrated call center systemOffers businesses an enterprise scale, virtual call

center infrastructure, and support resourcesSupports each stage of the call center lifecycleOffers call routing, agent and workforce

management, quality monitoring, and real time analysis

Fully customizable to meet business demands

ConclusionOutsourcing the call center functions is

GuildQuality’s best optionManaging the call center is not a value-add core

competency of GuildQualityThe on-demand call center solution offers a

comprehensive, fully integrated systemThe system can lower IT, labor and management

costs In the event that management does not see

outsourcing as a viable near-term solution, we suggest that management implement some of our process-focused suggestions in the short-term

Questions?