Six Sigma in the Contact Center

Northwest Call Center Professionals

Help Desk Northwest
May 17, 2006

Mike Stone

Agenda
Introduction to Six Sigma
Full Life-Cycle Case Study

Prepared by Mike
Stone

Introduction
Six Sigma was invented by Motorola, Inc. in
1986 as a metric for measuring defects and
improving quality. Since then, it has evolved to
a robust business improvement methodology
that focuses an organization on customer
requirements, process alignment, analytical
rigor and timely execution.

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http://www.motorola.com/content/0,,3074-5804,00.html
Stone

Six Sigma, the GE Way

Six Sigma - A vision of quality which equates with only
3.4 defects per million opportunities for each product or
service transaction. Strives for perfection.
DFSS (Design for Six Sigma) is a systematic
methodology utilizing tools, training and measurements
to enable us to design products and processes that meet
customer expectations and can be produced at Six
Sigma quality levels. (DMADV - Define, Measure,
Analyze, Design, Verify)
DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve and
Control) is a process for continued improvement. It is
systematic, scientific and fact based. This closed-loop
process eliminates unproductive steps, often focuses on
new measurements, and applies technology for
improvement.
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Source: http://www.ge.com/sixsigma/glossary.html
Stone

Other Quality Systems

Total Quality Management (TQM)

Toyota Production System (TPS)
Kaizen
Lean
Theory of Constraints
Agile
PDCA Plan, Do, Check, Act
Good Manufacturing Process Pharma
ISO 9000

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Key Concepts
A process is all the activities involved in
producing a product or service for a customer. It
is cross-functional in nature
Quality is defined by customer requirements for
the chosen process
Defects are defined and counted
Inconsistencies in the process, known as
variation, are studied
Causes of variation are identified and addressed
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Key Terminology
Critical to
Quality

Attributes most important to the customer

Defect

Failing to deliver what the customer wants

Opportunity

Event where success or failure can be determined

Process
Capability

Level of quality your process can deliver

Underlying factors that affect Ys

Measures being addressed by the project

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Key Terminology
Variation

What the customer sees and feels

Stable
Operations

Ensuring consistent, predictable processes to

improve what the customer sees and feels

Common Cause
of Variation

A source of failure that is always present as part of

the random variation inherent in the process

Special Cause
of Variation

A source of failure that lies outside the Process,

and so is intermittent, unpredictable, unstable

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DMAIC
Define

Measure

Analyze

Improve

Control

Team Chartering
Customer Focus
Process Mapping
Measurement
Variation
Data Collection
Data Analysis
Process Analysis and Focus
Root Cause Analysis
Quantify Opportunity
Generate Solutions
Select Solutions
Implementation Planning
Monitor the Process
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Documentation
Stone
Institutionalize

Case Study

IT services business
Customer service call center

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Project Selection
Business strategy
How important is customer satisfaction?
How important is it to attract new customers?

Competitive position
How do we compare to our competitors?
Benchmarking

Best projects
Issue is well-defined with supporting data
Scope is well-defined
Objectives are stated in business terms and are
measurable
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Project Selection
Customer satisfaction
Average
Lower than best-in-class in industry

Positive correlation with account growth

Customer satisfaction and new accounts are
statistically related to one another
Business judgment

No correlation with customer service spending

Per call costs were not higher at strong competitors

Goals: Reduce support costs while improving

new account growth
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Define
Team Chartering
Goal statement: "Increase the call center's industrymeasured customer satisfaction rating from its
current-level (90th percentile = 75 percent) to the
target level (90th percentile = 85 percent) by end of
the fourth-quarter without increasing support costs.
Milestones, tasks, responsibilities, schedule and
communication plan.

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Define
Customer Focus
SIPOC diagram identify customers (stakeholders)
Customers
Staff
Business

Voice of the Customer interviews

"What influences your level of satisfaction with our services?"

Summarize customer requirements

Identify measures for each requirement
Next slide
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Define
Requirement

Measure (CTQ)

Quickly connect with a helpful

person

Wait Time

Get the information I need

Transfers; Service Time

Apply the information, with help if

needed

Customer Satisfaction,
Support Cost

Understand how to avoid problems

recurring

Days to Close

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Define
Process mapping
Helpful during the Measure phase, as the project
team considers how and where to gather data that will
shed light on the root cause of the issues most
pertinent to the project's goals.

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Measure
Define measures and how the data will be
gathered
Example:
Customer Satisfaction
By industry standard monthly survey
The project will require additional, more frequent, case-bycase customer-satisfaction data. A measurement system that
tracks with the industry survey will be devised and validated.

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Measure
Define performance standards
Example:
Customer Satisfaction
Current Baseline
90th Percentile / 70-80% Satisfied

Performance Target
90th Percentile / 85% Satisfied

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Measure
Identify segmentation factors for data
collection plan
Focus data collection effort
Use cause-and-effect tools
How is Y naturally segmented?
Call center, product type?

What factors may be driving the Ys?

Take a guess at what your important Xs might be
Call type, customer type?
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Measure
Assess measurement system
Accuracy
Does the measure agree with the truth?

Repeatability
Does the system always produce the same value?

Reproducibility
Will different people get the same results?

Stability
Is the system accurate over time?

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Measure
Collect the data
Automated
Manual
New metrics may be needed

Display the data

Look for clues into causes of variation
Simple charts and graphs
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Analyze
Measure process capability
Compare current performance to standards

Refine improvement goals

Adjust goals if data shows departure from
expectations

Segment data
Slice and dice data to look for patterns to find
causes of variation
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Analyze
Identify possible Xs
Likely suspect causes of variation

Identify and verify the critical Xs

Narrow down to most important causes of variation
Why do Problems and Changes cost more than other
call types?
Why are calls processed on Mondays and Fridays
more expensive?
Why do transfer rates differ by call type? (higher on
Problems and Changes, lower on others)
Why are wait times higher on Mondays and Fridays
and on Week 13 of each quarter?
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Analyze
Refine the benefit forecast
Update the forecast of how much improvement can
be expected
Found that key support cost drivers (the delays and
interruptions during call-servicing) were the same as
those known to drive down customer satisfaction so
a win-win seemed to be possible.

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Improve
Identify Solution Alternatives
Driving Xs

Solution Alternatives

Staffing

Add staff Mondays and Fridays, reduce staff on

Sundays
Develop staffing model
Create on-call list to fill-in for absentees

Web Service Percentage

Focus on services that can be done best on the

Web
Define and communicate the value prop to
customers
Evaluate incentives to move traffic to the Web

Transfers and Callbacks

Improve call center processes to reduce transfers

and callbacks without impacting customer
satisfaction

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Improve
Verify the Relationships Between Xs and
Ys
Solution Selection Matrix
Solution Alternatives
Customer Requirements (CTQs)

Regression Analysis
Determine the strength of each solution against the
CTQs
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Improve
Select and Tune the Solution
Details of the plan for the Monday staffing pilot
program:
Xs to adjust: Staffing level (add five for pilot, full
increment to wait for evidence plan works)
Ys to measure for impact and unintended side effects:
Wait time, v/s ratio, customer satisfaction,
transfers, callbacks, service time.
Compare "new staff" versus "old staff" (hypothesis
test).
Measure monthly to observe learning curve effect,
if any
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Improve
Details of the plan for the Monday staffing pilot
program:
Measurement system issues: Revise existing
sampling plan and data collection process to
distinguish new staff from old staff.
Because the current customer satisfaction sampling
gives only 1 data point per month (not enough to see
a change), arrange a special sample five per day for
the first 60 days of the pilot (80 percent from existing
staff, 20 percent from new staff).
People and logistics issues: Communicate what is
happening and why. Emphasize evaluation is not of
individuals, only overall impact.
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Improve
Implement Solution
Pilot, if possible

Collect data during pilot

Xs and Ys
Watch for unintended impacts

Report out and obtain approval for full

implementation
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Control
Develop Control Plan
Management control dashboards Ys
Operational control indicators Xs

Determine Improved Process Capability

Business Growth
Customer Satisfaction
Support Cost per Call
Days to Close
Wait Time
Transfers
Service Time

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Control
Implement Process Control
Ongoing data collection and presentation

Close Project
Roll out process changes

Training
Transition control to management
Validate results
Refinements

Project
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post mortem

Tools

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Tools
ANOVA
ANalysis Of VAriance (ANOVA), a calculation procedure
to allocate the amount of variation in a process and
determine if it is significant or is caused by random noise.

Cause and Effect Diagram

A cause and effect diagram is a visual tool used to
logically organize possible causes for a specific problem
or effect by graphically displaying them in increasing
detail. It helps to identify root causes and ensures
common understanding of the causes. It is also called an
Ishikawa
diagram.
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Tools
Control Chart
A graphical tool for monitoring changes that occur within
a process, by distinguishing variation that is inherent in
the process (common cause) from variation that yield a
change to the process (special cause).
Kano Analysis
Kano analysis is a quality measurement tool used to
prioritize customer requirements based on their impact to
customer satisfaction.
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Tools
Pareto
The Pareto principle states that 80% of the impact of the
problem will show up in 20% of the causes. A bar chart
that displays by frequency, in descending order, the most
important defects.
Run Chart
A performance measure of a process over a specified
period of time used to identify trends or patterns.
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Tools
X-Bar and R Charts
This set of two charts is the most commonly used
statistical process control procedure. Used to monitor
process behavior and outcome overtime.

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Resources

http://www.isixsigma.com/
http://www.sixsigmainstitute.com/
http://www.motorola.com/motorolauniversity
http://www.ge.com/sixsigma/

The Six Sigma Way: How GE, Motorola, and Other Top Companies
are Honing Their Performance by Peter S. Pande, Robert P.
Neuman, Roland R. Cavanagh
Fourth Generation Management by Brian L. Joiner
Leading Six Sigma by Ronald D. Snee and Roger W. Hoerl
The Pocket Idiots Guide to Six Sigma by Marsha Shapiro and
Anthony Weeks
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Six Sigma in the Contact Center

Mike Stone
Mobile: (206) 779-3105
mgstone2020@yahoo.com