Your staff members complain about having too much work, the proportion of people on short-term sick-leave is consistently above average and the turnover rate is disturbingly high. However, comparing takt time and processing time does not show to any obvious issue. So, what is the problem?

MYTH: LEAN SIX SIGMA HAS MANY TOOLS I DO NOT NEED. Certainly, life is much easier without the need to choose between 50 advanced tools for problem solving. However, if the only tool available is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. In reality, there is a multitude of process problems that need more than a hammer…

“Voice of the Customer” – VOC in short – is a key topic in all kind of customer service, TQM or Lean Six Sigma training and related project work. There are two main categories for VOC data, reactive and proactive. Proactive data is collected with methods like focus groups, interviews, observations, surveys or test customers, […]

Ting is a sophisticated traditional Chinese character that exemplifies the most important activity related to customer service in an impressive way: Listening. The old Chinese already knew that by listening you open your ears (not the mouth), you treat the speaker as a king, focus wholeheartedly with 100% attention.

A team spends months on improving customer-facing branch processes of a bank. After benchmarking with sister companies across the world and after carefully mapping out process steps they come up with an improved flow that drastically reduces the processing time for branch customers. It surely looks like a nice success story. However, they get devastating […]

New undertakings or experiences are always challenging at first. This is no different when Schenker Singapore (Pte) Ltd, a transportation & logistics company, decides to embark on something new like Lean Six Sigma. It might seem to be even more demanding at the outset since the number of 3rd party logistics providers rising to this […]

A typical Friday evening starts with a family dinner in a nice atmosphere. This time we decide to visit one of our favourite restaurants for a light dinner with Sushi. Upon arrival we are amazed. Usually, this place is packed on a Friday evening. Today, more than half of the seats are empty. Therefore, going […]

Everyone, undoubtedly, has had the unenviable honour of experiencing ‘bureaucratic government processes.’ Be it applying for your first ID or passport, to initially obtaining a driving license and the inevitable dealings with the tax man. I had a different experience. No Red Tape …

Survey data should be analysed with different tools at the same time in order to find the most appropriate method to show “patterns in data” that lead to conclusions. The Kano analysis or the Jaccard index offer additional insights into survey data.
Remember: Attaining the data is expensive, analysing them is cheap.

Many companies spend considerable amounts of money on customer surveys every year. Customer survey results are being used to amend strategies, design new products and services, focus improvement activities and … to celebrate success. Since the impact of customer service results can be quite hefty the data driving important decisions shall be trust-worthy. The question […]