Unit II

Service Process
 Service Process
 A service process is a set of defined tasks needed to complete a given business
service activity, including who is responsible for completing each step, when, and
how they do so.
 Service organizations that consistently meet both cost and quality targets know
that they must manage the chain of processes from start to finish rather than
simply the final stage of delivery to customers.
 Service processes determine the procedures to be followed in service delivery and
also how various activities link together to provide the whole service.

 A five-star hotel prides itself on providing a wide  A budget hotel provides basic, reasonably
range of services for its guests. comfortable accommodation for travelers normally
staying for one or two nights. In this case, reception
 Staff at the reception desk are prepared to spend
processes are designed to carry out only the basic
time dealing with each customer’s request and
check-in and payment activities as quickly as
endeavour to answer every question. As a result,
possible. Guests are not encouraged to request
each transaction is quite lengthy and the hotel
extra services and the number of receptionists are
employs extra staff to ensure that the highest levels
maintained at the minimum level to keep costs low.
of service are achieved at all times for guests, who
are paying premium prices.
 Process Types in general

 Source: Bart Van Looy, Paul Gemmel, Roland Van Dierdonck Service Management – An Integrated Approach, Pearson Education, 3rd
Ed, 2013
 Relationship between process type and transaction
volume
Equipment/people focus.

Customer contact time per transaction.

Degree of customization.

Degree of discretion
• (discretion of the service delivering employee without consulting higher authority)

Value-added back office/front office

• proportion of back office employees vs proportion of front office employees)

Product/process focus
• emphasis on what customer buys vs emphasis on how the service is delivered to customer

 Source: Bart Van Looy, Paul Gemmel, Roland Van Dierdonck Service Management – An Integrated Approach, Pearson Education, 3rd Ed, 2013
 Three types of service process

 Professional services
 Service shops and
 Mass services

 Source: Bart Van Looy, Paul Gemmel, Roland Van Dierdonck Service Management – An Integrated Approach, Pearson Education, 3rd Ed, 2013
 Service Process Operational
 The nature of the process by which a service is Mass Services
delivered depends on the nature of the service. Pre-determined service
 The different types of service process lead to specifications
different challenges for the management of Identify customer needs and
operations, HRM and marketing. build them into service process
is a Challenge
Professional service
Service specifications during
the service delivery
To be able to adopt to changing
customer needs during service
process is a challenge

HRM Marketing:
 Styles can be differentiated by the amount of Professional services Mass Services
employee involvement and participation in Emphasis on Employees and Emphasis on physical
shaping the service encounter their competencies components and procedures
 Social and interpersonal skills – less in fast Service concept of firm and More focus on technology and
food, more in other contribution by each employee delivery of services
 Career development is key in professional needs to be understood every
services where employees are critical employee
Firm must be sure the Process well fitted to needs of customer
 In service shops and factories – workforce segment – fast food vs 3star hotel
scheduling is key
 Designing the service process
 Service management scholars are proposing the use of more systematic
approaches to designing customer needs into the service processes.
 One of these approaches, borrowed from the manufacturing industry, is
quality function deployment (QFD).
 Quality Function Deployment (QFD) is a process and set of tools used to
effectively define customer requirements and convert them into detailed
engineering specifications and plans to produce the products that fulfill
those requirements.
 QFD is used to translate customer requirements (or VOC) into measureable
design targets and drive them from the assembly level down through the
sub-assembly, component and production process levels.
 QFD was first developed in Japan by Yoji Akao in the late 1960s while
working for Mitsubishi’s shipyard. It was later adopted by other companies
including Toyota and its supply chain
 Applications of this technique have considerably reduced the cost of design
and development of new products.
 The service applications of QFD are rather limited but are nevertheless
promising
Quality function deployment (QFD)
 QFD is divided into 4 major phases: Product Planning,
Product Development, Process Planning, and Production
Planning
 House of quality gives major inputs to QFD
 Service blueprinting
 A service blueprint is a picture or a map that accurately
portrays the service system so that the different people
(including the customer) involved in delivering it can
understand and deal with it objectively.