Post-Conference Day Workshop
Date: Wednesday, October 31st, 2007
Time: 8:30am to 2:30pm
Nobody Knows the [Service] Trouble I've Seen
A utility company, a telecommunications company, and a computer services company all offer a customer appointment. What's the difference? The (not so funny) joke is that there is very little difference, and yet many companies fail to leverage the experience of leading service companies simply because they are "not like us." Every service company strives to respond faster, do more, and all at a lower cost. Most customer-facing service operations offer customer appointments, and would like to know the optimal window size. We all face the pressures of balancing due dates and service costs, whether originating internally (boards, shareholders) or from outside of our walls (customers, regulators).
This interactive lecture will break away from the constraints imposed by our "industrial blinders." After decomposing the service lifecycle according to the service functions common to many industries, we will look at best practices and lessons learned for managing overtime, offering appointments, prioritizing work, segmenting and sharing the workforce, and other topics. While recognizing that nobody does know exactly the trouble you've seen, we all sing the same service blues.
Moderator Biography
Mike Karlskind
Senior Business Analyst
ClickSoftware
Mike Karlskind has been working with service organizations for over 10 years across industries and the world to streamline processes and optimize service decisions. As Senior Business Analyst, his experience is a collection of lessons from companies in computer services, utilities, telecommunications, capital equipment, home services, retail services, insurance, and medical equipment. Mike authors and contributes to articles for industry publications, and leads executive seminars on the subject of service process efficiency and optimized decision-making. He holds a B.A. (and continuing interest) in mathematics and is a contributor to ClickSoftware's patent for the "Method and system for assigning human resources to provide services" (US 6,985,872 B2).
