Quality Service Management PDF

**QUALITY SERVICE MANAGEMENT** **LESSON 1** **[INTRODUCTION TO QUALITY SERVICE IN TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY]** +-----------------------------------------------------------------------+ | **Service Quality Management** | +=======================================...

**QUALITY SERVICE MANAGEMENT** **LESSON 1** **[INTRODUCTION TO QUALITY SERVICE IN TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY]** +-----------------------------------------------------------------------+ | **Service Quality Management** | +=======================================================================+ | Any hotel business, to be successful, needs to ensure that  it  is  | | providing  quality   service   to   its customers.  | | | | ##### **How to ensure proper service quality management?** | | | | Customer satisfaction is what drives hotel managers to ensure that | | quality services are delivered in the best ways possible. And | | since **service quality in the hotel industry **is determined by | | customer feedback, strategies should be devised to compute the level | | of these services. | +-----------------------------------------------------------------------+ ##### **1. Measurement** helps hotels to identify the standard of their delivered service and determine problems related to the quality of the same.  ##### **2.Rating-** Thousands of hotels aim at securing the top position on hotel ranking indexes. It officially certifies the high level of quality service offered by a reputed hotel. ##### **3.Benchmarking -**To enhance customer satisfaction, many hotels adapt to the strategy of benchmarking. ##### **Importance of service quality management in the hospitality and tourism industry** Systematic quality management improves the overall health of hospitality and tourism industry. ##### **1. Customer Loyalty** In any kind of business, a satisfied customer is the one who is happy with the services.  ##### **2. Happier Environment-** While the physical perception of a hotel is one of the most important aspects for determining customer satisfaction, it is not important, however, to invest time and resources in building over-the-top designs. ##### **3. Improved Security-** The hotel security level has a direct impact on the brand reputation of the business.  ##### **4. Brand Value-** Every business on earth thrives on brand value.  ##### **Characteristics of the Hospitality and Tourism Industry** The first thing to do when designing a business strategy for any industry is to have deep knowledge of its most important product. **1.  Intangibility-**Tourism products are services and, as such, they are largely intangible though with tangible, concrete elements. **2.  Limited life-span-**Tourism products cannot be stored so, unless consumed when planned, they are waste.  **3.  Aggregability-** A tourism product can be formed by aggregating various products, and this makes its commercialization and quality control more difficult.  ##### **4.  Heterogeneity-** As mentioned, aggregability implies a difficulty when it is about controlling all phases so that they are at the same level of excellence.  ­­­ **LESSON 2** ### [CROSS-CULTURAL ISSUES IN SERVICE QUALITY] ##### **Customer Diversity: Providing Great Customer Experience Across Cultures ** The world is getting smaller. Nations and communities are becoming more diverse. Due to advances in communication, the spread of e-commerce and the ease of travel, many businesses today can expand to cross cultural and geographic boundaries.  **E-Commerce Businesses** may easily receive orders from virtually anywhere. **Professionalism** customer service means different things to different people, but all of them are worthy of your time, respect and attention. ##### **Respecting customer diversity is more than simply good manners** We all know the old golden rule: treat others the way you want to be treated. But simply treating customers with the same courtesy and dignity is no longer enough in this shrinking world. ##### **Making cross-cultural customer interactions simple** Whether your customer interactions carried out by phone, via email, in Live Chat or in person, there are some common sense principles that could significantly improve service. **1.  Reinforce importance of recognizing customer diversity - **Every business has a culture, and respecting diversity should be one of the primary values guiding your team.  **2.  Know your customers and seek out culture-specific knowledge - **The nature of your clientele is more likely than ever to consist of people from all corners of the world.  **3.  Listen actively and recognize patterns for communicating - **Customer service representatives with good listening skills can quickly build rapport, effectively address the issue and suggest a timely solution. **4. Create a welcoming environment by having a diverse workforce - **Hiring bilingual employees who not only speak some other language but also have unique insights into different cultures would help create a fantastic customer experience.  **5. Share your experiences with colleagues to work out consistent approaches - **Cultural diversity is a real gift for customer service reps. Dealing with customers from other cultures provides a great opportunity to learn from others and grow in our humanity.  ##### **Divergence and Convergence** Divergence and convergence are modes of thinking, mostly used by design thinkers as a creative process to define and solve problems in a business/real-world context. **Convergence**, on the other hand, is a mode of thinking where you're using your left brain to analyze things and think them through logically, so to speak.  Convergence is about analysis, critique, judgement, and feedback. Ideas that might seem ridiculous at the start (in the divergent phase) become more realistic when you spend a few minutes in each phase, and this works for any creative process. **Divergence** is purely a right-brained activity. Convergence is left-brained. When you're diverging, you're giving yourself the space to create with or without constraints.  **The tools you can use to facilitate convergent thinking (logical/analytical tools) may vary widely.** **Examples**: - Any tool that you can use to rank or to give a rating of some kind can be used to evaluate your choices. Using selective criteria with grid is an example of such a tool. - Your list manager is another example of a convergent tool. You've previously captured things that had your attention (diverge) to figure out what they mean to you and what to do with them later (converge). In fact, you're practicing both of these process skills with your list manager. - Here's how you can use these process skills in your knowledge work: - You can't "prioritize" (converge) until you know everything you have on your plate (diverge); the reverse doesn't work. - Capture things on the go in your list manager first (diverge), and decide later what to do with it (converge). - For weekly planning: at the end of the week, diverge on a list of things you want to work on by the end of next week, then converge by deciding which ones to work on and schedule them in your calendar. - How do you decide what you're doing today (if you don't already have a running list of things you need to do at some point)? You make a list of everything you have on your mind that you think needs to be done today, then you figure out what you actually want to do from this list, and skip the rest. Unless you actually know **everything **you have on your plate, how can you do **anything **at all? - Run effective meetings: start out by creating an agenda by involving members to participate to figure out what you want to discuss, then prioritize the list and figure out how you want to set it up (with constraints). - Process email quickly from the inbox (diverge), then batch-process all emails in relevant folders, such as Action, Hold, etc. (converge). - Use a mind map to explore anything by way of ideation (diverge). This is also a great way to plan your projects. **Here are some examples from our daily lives:** ·         Writing Morning Pages is a great example of practicing these process skills. When you write Morning Pages (diverge) to find out what has your attention, you can later decide what to do with it (converge). - Listen to others (diverge) before giving them solicited feedback (converge). - Flip through TV channels to figure out what you want to watch (diverge) before settling on a channel (converge). - Develop your own taste in art, whether it be films, music, books, or what have you. You need to explore a variety of media in order to figure out your own tastes. For instance, you have to listen to a lot of different music (diverge) to find the ones you like (converge); ditto with books, films...anything of interest, really. - See all the food choices at a dinner party before picking and choosing what you want to eat. You can't eat it all, so pick and choose by exploring your options first, and then decide on what to eat. - When you reflect in the evening, ask yourself: what did I do today? What's the best thing that happened today? You'll see that unless you ask the first question (diverge), you'll have trouble coming up with an answer to the second question (converge). ##### **GLOBAL MARKETING STRATEGY - STANDARDIZATION VS. ADAPTATION** Taking your business global and successfully selling your products and services in international markets can pose many challengers.  ##### **Standardization vs. Adaptation** The first view is the standardization standpoint (as proposed by Jain, 1989; Levitt, 1983). According to these authors, supporters of standardization believe that there is a union of cultures with similar environmental and customer demand around the globe. They argue that trade barriers are getting lower and that technological advances and firms are displaying a global orientation in their strategy. **Standardization and international uniformity has many advantages**. For one, people can expect the same level of quality of any specific brand anywhere around the world. **Standardization, however, poses a number of disadvantages**. As mentioned previously, different markets mean different preferences. Selling one unified product lacks uniqueness. Consumer nondurables, including food products, are the most sensitive to differences in national tastes and habits, making them more likely to need changes for various markets. **Striking The Right Balance** ##### Both approaches appear to be rational, logical and coherent, highlighting the advantages and benefits that a multinational company could gain by using either approach. **LESSON 3** ### [TECHNOLOGY AND ITS IMPACT ON SERVICE QUALITY] ##### **The move from personal service to automation and self service** Previously, when facing a service delivery, you were met with service personnel ready to support you all the way through your customer journey. Today, and due to the emerging impact of technology, we see more and more examples of self service and automated service solutions. These include online airline check-in, self-service checkout lanes in retail stores, gas pumps and supermarkets. ##### **The portfolio of accessible services is increasing** With the world wide web also came a world without boundaries. Or in other words, technology has now expanded our potential to reach out to customers around the globe in ways that were not to be dreamed off in the not so distant past. ##### **The rise in consumer data** When talking about self-service delivery, automation and an increase in online services, some critics point to the idea that service deliveries increasingly will become less and less personal. But does this mean that we sooner or later will lose the human touch? Not necessarily. It depends on how good we are at balancing the great things technology can provide us with as well as our sense of what defines quality service. ##### **Can Technology Improve Guest Service Quality in Hospitality and Tourism?** Technology has arguably been one of the main driving forces in the growth of many economies and organizations around the world. The tourism industry, and hotels in particular, have seen an abundance of benefits which technology can bring to internal operations and guest service quality. ##### **The Role of Technology in Improving Guest Service Quality** The traditional approach to building guest satisfaction tends to be through the use of physical labor and to some extent this is still the case.  ##### **Implications of Technology Implementation** Although technology provides a number of benefits and hotels and their ability to improve guest quality, there are also a number of implications which can be considered. Perhaps the most important point to consider is the fact that technology is continually changing.  ##### **Technology Strategies for Small Hotels** This topic focuses on the larger (full service) aspect of the industry where technology plays an important role and will continue to do so into the future.  ##### **INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY APPLICATIONS IN HOSPITALITY AND TOURISM** The intense competition in today\'s business environment means that tourism and hospitality businesses have to work hard to maintain and develop their competitiveness. ##### **How Information Technology Has Affected the Tourism and Hospitality Industry** Information Technology has played an important role in the hospitality and tourism industry over the last decade.  Here are some examples of the ways that IT continues to improve the hospitality and tourism industry. **\  Internet and Marketing** The internet has a powerful impact on hospitality and tourism. A customer‟s first experience with your business is a visit to your website.  ##### **Computer Systems** Computer systems allow communication between larger hotel chains with multiple locations to connect easier.  ##### **Mobile Communication** Mobile tablets and smartphones have replaced large desktop computers, making them virtually extinct. This is helpful, because many travelers take some type of mobile device with them on a trip. **LESSON 4** ### [SERVICE QUALITY CONCEPTS AND DIMENSIONS PERTINENT TO TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY] ##### **Salient features of service quality:** 1. **Inseparability of production and consumption** - In service industries, usually the marketer creates or performs the service at the same time as the full or partial consumption of the service takes place.  2.   **Intangibility of service - **Many services are essentially intangible. The lack of tangible attributes means that it is difficult for the producer to describe the service and for the consumer to ascertain its likely virtues.  3.  **Perishability of services **- Services are perishable and cannot be stored in one-time period for consumption at a later date. 4.  **Heterogeneity of services - **Heterogeneity of services. It is often difficult to reproduce a service consistently and exactly. ##### **Obstacles to Attaining Service Quality Improvements** The obstacles to service quality improvements are identified and discussed below: ** Lack of visibility. **Service quality problems are not always visible to the provider. **Difficulties in assigning specific accountability. **The consumer\'s overall perception of service quality is influenced by experience at different stages of service delivery.  **Time required to improve service quality. **Service quality problems often require major effort over a long period of time to resolve.  ** Delivery uncertainties. **Control of service delivery and quality is complicated by the individual and unpredictable nature of people.  ##### **The attainment of \"service quality\" requires:** (1)   Market and customer focus. (2)   Empowerment of frontline staff. (3)   Well-trained and motivated staff. (4)   A clear \"service quality\" vision. **Definition of Quality** The term \"quality\" means a different thing to different people. This is why defining \"quality\" is often the first step in most \"quality improvement\" journeys.  **The five generic categories and their relevance to service organizations.** 1. **Transcendent**. Here \"quality\" is defined as innate excellence. The product or service will have unequalled properties.  2. **  Product led. **Here \"quality\" is defined as the units of goodness packed into a product or service. 3. **Process or supply led**. In this approach, \"quality\" is defined as \"conformance to requirements\". The definitions of quality proposed by Crosby and Taguchi fall within this category. 4. **Customer led**. Here the focus is external. \"Quality\" is defined as \"satisfying customer\'s requirements\" or \"fitness for purpose\". The definitions of quality put forward by Deming, 5. **Value led. **\"Quality\", here, is defined either as the \"cost to the producer and price to the customer\" or as \"meeting the customer\'s requirements in terms of quality, price, and availability\". The focus again is external.  **Determinants of Quality** \"Quality\" is not a singular but a multi-dimensional phenomenon.  1. **The technical quality of outcome**. That is to say, the actual outcome of the service encounter.  2. ** The functional quality of the service encounter**. This element of \"quality\" is concerned with the interaction between the provider and recipient of a service and is often perceived in a subjective manner.  3. **The corporate image**. This is concerned with consumers\' perceptions of the service organization. Lehtinen and Lehtinen also contend that \"service quality\" has three dimensions. These were: (1**)   Physical quality**. This includes such items as the condition of buildings and enabling equipment. (2)   **Corporate quality**. This refers to the organization\'s image and profile. (3)    **Interactive quality.** This derives from the interaction between service organizations\' personnel and the customer as well as the interaction between customers.  A modified version of the service quality determinants proposed by Parasuraman et al. is described below. The proposed modifications and the introduction of a new determinant are based on our current research. Moreover, examples from various service industries are provided for clarity. 1. Reliabilty 2. Responsiveness 3. Customization 4. Credibility 5. Competence 6. Access 7. Courtesy 8. Security 9. Communication 10. Tangibles 11. Understanding/ knowing customer Conceptual Service Quality Models ================================= A service organization can broadly adopt one of two basic approaches to service quality management: (1) passive or reactive; or \(2) strategic or proactive. ** consumer culture** we love stories of really good or really bad service---and, especially, of heroic service recovery. The first actions toward systemic service change is about giving definition to what needs to be accomplished. The results need to be tangible, measurable, and specific. As with any process, the more questions asked, the more successful the outcome.  1\. Secure an accurate set of data to assess the current customer experience.  2\. Clarify the intended role of customer service and satisfaction as a strategic driver for your business in the near and long term.  3\. Define what customer service means at the organization.  4\. Set specific and accurate measures to best capture critical information on customer service, satisfaction, and loyalty.  5\. Clarify the value proposition for your customers.  6\. Clarify the customer relationship process o from end to end.  7\. Map the customer experience or transactional processes to uncover potential ―positive defining moments‖ from the customer perspective.  8\. Create and launch a comprehensive communications plan.  9\. Review and align current customer service policies.  10\. Determine a set of selection criteria for new employees -- and for those who represent the organization in the market -- that reflects the customer service commitment.  11\. Train, train and train....   12\. Periodically measure progress, then communicate and celebrate success.  13\. Institute an ongoing, continual improvement approach to customer service.  **LESSON 5** ### [THE IMPACT OF PEOPLE, PROCESS, AND PHYSICAL EVIDENCE ON SERVICE QUALITY] The challenges encountered relative to service quality on tourism and hospitality-like heterogeneity -- the requirements of the customers while delivering service and perishability and absence of inventory, intangibility of offers and absence of patent protection, etc. necessitate the presence of the marketing mix such as PEOPLE, PROCESS and PHYSICAL EVIDENCE.  **People.**  An extremely important part of any company is having the right people to support the company‟s products and/or service.  **People in Service -**  In service, the personnel come in contact with the process of production and consumption of services. **Types of Service Personnel: ** Customer contact as it is the vital part of the quality of service experience.    Labor Intensive (people based): sales creation, delivery, personalized services...   Equipment Based: automatic car wash, automatic vending machines, etc.  **The classification of personnel from market point of view:  ** **Customer Contact Employees-** also called as frontline staff/ boundary spanners. Includes office staff, air hostess, bank clerk, waiters in hotels etc.   The varying degrees of personnel in customer contact are: High Contact Personnel (eg: hospitals, restaurants, education, institutions)  Low contact personnel (eg: retailing, banks, post office) Skilled and professional (eg: doctors, lawyers, consultants)   Non-professional (eg: telephone operators, retail clerks, courier delivery)  Support Personnel/Non-Contact Employee - The employees who contribute to the service delivery but do not come into contact with the customer. eg: chefs in hotels, cockpit crews, administrative staff. **Process**.  Solid procedures and policies that are in place, which pertains to the company‟s products and/or service, is an extremely valuable element to the marketing strategy.  **Service Process** refers to how a service is provided or delivered to the customer.  For this, the service process must be designed.   **Designing Service Process: ** **The factors to be considered in the Service design process are**:   The Service Itself   Customer Participation   Degree of Customer contact   Degree of Divergence   Location of Service Delivery   Complexity of Service  **Physical Evidence.**  This refers to the way the product, service, and everything about the company appears from the outside.  **Product liability insurance** is needed in case anyone suffers any harm from your product or service.  **Visual packaging** of a tangible product can make or break a purchase.  Small improvements in the packaging or external appearance of your product or service can lead to completely different reactions from your customers.  **The factors that tangibilize services: ** **[Physical Facility]** (Essential Peripheral Evidence)   The elements of physical evidence are:   **Essential Evidence-** Constitutes a dominant part of the service facility.  **Peripheral Evidence-**   They definitely have an impact on the consumer perception about the quality of the service These include business cards, stationery, brochures, etc.   **[Physical Setting]** (Appearance of the premises- design & decor)   The physical setting or the service environment within which the service takes place.  The "service space" includes:   the exterior attributes (the parking area, front elevation of the building, landscape)   the interior attributes (the design, ambiance, layout, etc)    The important elements of physical settings are as follows:   Ambiance   Décor and Artifacts   Spatial Layout and Functionality  **[Social Settings] (Appearance of Staff) ** It pertains with the appearance and attitude of staffs:  their technical skill, interactive skill, personalities and attitude towards work, consistency of quality performance and their appearance.    Role of physical evidence:  Facilitator: Enhances performance level of personnel in the environment   Socializer: Helps to convey expected roles, behavior and relationship in the interaction process Differentiator: Can differentiate the service from its competitors   Impression: Helps in shaping „first impression‟   Image and Identity: Portrays the corporate image and builds corporate identity