MIS 1: Why Call Centres?

Call centres are basically, now a days act as an interface between public and the
organization, called sometimes as a point of contact for customers and public at large. Away
from the public & the organization it self, it routes the calls to a particular department and acts
as a first – stage filter for calls. Simple and routine enquiries are dealt with automatically; using
computer generated messages or can be handled and satisfied by the operators who have
some understanding of business and its operations and are aware of FAQ’s.

In present day scenario, the goal and role of call centres has changed from mere
traditional operational services providers for financial sectors companies to large companies
including entertainment, cinema, tours & travel operators and local authorities to use call
centres to handle first-line enquiries. The credit of the success of call centres goes undoubtedly
to the rapid growth in IT sector and especially in telephony. Now, smaller size computerized
systems have replaced big switch boards, and even many systems employee voice-recognition
softwares.

The most fundamental effort of establishing a call centre is for the organizations to gain
a competitive advantage. The cost of dealing with customers enquiries falls, and is set up with
core, the quality of customer satisfaction & service is increased.

The workflow through call centre is controlled by the system itself. The agents are very
important as they are customer’s first point of contact with the company. Call centres in the
past, have shown very high employee - turnover and high level of absenteeism because of
intense working atmosphere and wages were relatively low. So, the agents need to be managed
effectively & tactfully.

Q1. Describe the system model for a call centre & the organization.
Q2. “Decision making process is supported largely by data collected both automatically and by
the agents at the call centre.” Justify.
Q3. Consider two organizations of your choice, each involved in different activity or business.
Consider the following types of calls that can be taken by their call centres.
Q4. To what extent any organization can get competitive advantage from using a call centre?
Q5. How the benefits of the call centres can be brought about? Discuss it.
 MIS 2: Office Automation Systems
ABC Company processes more than 5000 customer-orders a month, drawing on a
combined inventory of over 500 office products stock at Co’s warehouse. About 40
workstations, with printers are installed at Co’s headquarters and are connected to a LAN.

Orders are received by phone or mail and entered into the system by order entry
personnel at network computers. Entry of orders is assisted by formatted screens. As the order
is entered, the mid range computer checks he availability of the products, updates the
customer and product databases stored on computer’s magnetic disks. It then sends the pick
list to warehouse printer, for further processing by warehouse personnel.

Co’s sales manager, inventory manager and others executives have PC workstations in
their offices. They use simple Data Base Management inquiry commands to get responses &
reports concerning sales orders, customers and inventory to review product demand and
service trends.

Q1. Outline the important Information System component in ABC Co’s order processing system.
Q2. Identify network software and data, network resources of order processing information
system.
Q3. Identify the various activities occurring in this information systems.
 POM 1: Job Shop Scheduling
Consider the following two machines and six jobs flow shop scheduling problem. Using
Johnson’s algorithm, obtain the optimal sequence which will minimize the makes span.

Job Machine Number

i M1 M2
1 5 4
2 2 3
3 13 14 POM 2: Selection of Plant
4 10 1 Location
5 8 9
6 12 11 A company has to select one location out of
the five alternatives considered for a new plant. The annual operating costs and other tangible
factors are given below for these five locations.

Factors Location
A B C D E
(a) Economic Factors
Labor Costs (Rs.) 1,20,000 1,10,000 1,60,000 85,000 75,000
Transportation Costs (Rs.) 10,000 8,000 7,000 12,000 14,000
Local Taxes (Rs.) 17,000 20,000 25,000 19,000 17,000
Cost of Power (Rs.) 21,000 29,000 25,000 18,000 23,000
Other Costs (Rs.) 16,000 11,000 12,000 16,000 18,000
(b) Intangible Factors
Community Attitude Very Good Fair Good Fair Very Good
Labor Availability Good Very Good Fair Outstanding Acceptable
Quality of Transportation Fair Acceptable Outstanding Acceptable Fair
Quality of Life Acceptable Fair Good Very Good Outstanding

(a) On the basis of annual operating factors, which site would you choose?
(b) Devise a method of quantifying the intangible factors and integrate them with the cost
data into the overall evaluation. Which is best now?