Telecommunication Service For Vodafone

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

This write-up is based on an interview I had with the Head of Fixed Services at Vodafone. The purpose of the interview was to get information on a decision that the business recently took to solve a problem. It looks at the scope of the problem, the people involved in taking the decision, the alternatives that were available, and the implementation of the decision. It also looks at the role of computers (if any) in taking that decision.

SCOPE OF THE PROBLEM

A problem is the difference between the desired/expected situation or condition and the actual.

The Head of fixed services indicated during the interview that the business had an SLA (Service Level Agreement) between The Retail outfit and the FAN (Fixed Access Network) team for installation of ADSL services. The SLA was that the ADSL service should be installed and activated for the applicant within 7 days after a customer requests for service at the Retail outfit. It was also stated in the ADSL service provisioning contract between Vodafone and the applicant that, within 7 working days from the time the applicant submits an application form, service will be installed.

It became evident that there was a serious breach of the SLA for ADSL installation. Data gathered by the Quality Assurance team revealed that new ADSL installations were taking on the average, 28 working days to complete. This was a problem because there was a huge difference between the actual situation and the expected.

The PROBLEM: Vodafone was not abiding by the terms in the ADSL service provisioning contract it had with customers. On the average, there was a delay of 21 working days in providing the ADSL service.

THE PROBLEM OWNERS

The problem owners are the teams or individuals who are mandated to ensure that all the processes put in place for the timely provision of service are followed as directed by the business. They are supposed to identify trouble spots and come up with solutions to address them. The following are the problem owners:

The Retail Operations Team: This team was to ensure/enforce strict adherence to the SLA by the frontline Retail staffs that interface with the customers. They were to ensure that requests for ADSL service were processed (within SLA) by the frontline retail staffs for the generation of work orders.

Fixed Services Management Team: This team comprises of the Head of Fixed Services and her direct reports. They were to ensure that work orders from the Retail team and other teams in the business that assist in the provision of service were completed within the stipulated timelines stated in the SLA.

The Quality Assurance Team: They are responsible for the monitoring of the entire service provisioning process from beginning to end. They monitor both teams to ensure that the prescribed processes are adhered to. They are equipped with a lot of tools to assist them in performing their functions effectively.

IDENTIFYING THE DECISION-MAKING PHASES-FROM THE INTERVIEW

According to Adam & Pomerol (2004), the following are the phases in Simon’s decision-making process; intelligence, design, choice and implementation.

The Intelligence Phase

The Organizational objective: The formulation of internal SLAs for the provision of the ADSL service and achieving the targets in the SLAs was the objective of the business.

Search and Scanning procedures: Procedures used by the Quality Assurance team to scan the operations of the Retail and FAN teams.

Data Collection: Use of computer based query systems to collect data from service provisioning application software used by the teams. These query systems provide data on activities performed by staffs that process customer orders.

Problem Identification: The Quality Assurance team was able to detect that the SLAs were being breached. They used the data collection tools to detect that the number of days taken to complete installations was far more than the number of days in the SLA.

Problem Statement: All the problem owners agreed that there was a problem at hand; Vodafone was not abiding by the terms in the ADSL service provisioning contract it had with customers. On the average, there was a delay of 21 working days in providing the ADSL service.

The Design Phase

Formulation of a Model and Criteria for selection: Information I gathered was that the problem existed in all the 36 exchanges in the whole country. A model exchange was selected based on the following criteria; customer base, number of Retail and FAN staff, amount of resources available to the teams (technology, logistics, information systems, etc), average number of requests for new ADSL connections per day and fault incidence rate. The model exchange was supposed to be a replica of the general situation in the whole country so that whatever decision that is taken based on the model exchange can be applied to the other exchanges.

ALTERNATIVE CHOICES

Data collected revealed that too much time was taken to process customer orders at the Retail frontline level. Furthermore, FAN technicians were also taking too long to execute work orders that were assigned to them in the order processing application software. These delays were in serious breach of the SLA. The delays were primarily because operatives were not updating the order processing application software on time and also operatives were not consistently calling subscribers to give them updates.

The alternative choices were:

Create special desks in the Retail shops and assign dedicated staff to handle new requests for ADSL service. In addition, assign a dedicated FAN technician in every exchange to update the application.

Set up a dedicated central order processing team in the head office or Call Centre that will process all the requests from all the Retail outlets in the country. The retail operatives will enter requests unto an online interface. The dedicated team will be responsible for all updates in the application software from beginning to end, i.e. they will take full ownership of the process. They will also be making outbound calls to customers. The local FAN technicians will conduct field surveys and physical line installations.

THE DECISION CHOSEN

The decision chosen was the second alternative i.e. a dedicated central order processing team in the head office or Call Centre that will process all the requests from all the Retail outlets in the country

IMPLEMENTATION OF THE DECISION

The chosen alternative was tested on the model exchange for 30 days. A central processing team of 10 members was formed. They were to process online orders from the Retail teams, do data entry and retrieval, liaise with the FAN teams for work orders and call customers.

A lot of data was collected over the trial period. The retail and FAN teams in the model exchange initially had challenges with the new procedures put in place to ensure the smooth running of the new setup. The problem owners had to constantly communicate the new changes to the frontlines to ensure total compliance. There was constant feedback from the problem owners to the frontlines based on data collected from the order processing application software. The feedback was to encourage frontlines to follow the new guidelines and also to identify peculiar challenges they were facing. Training was done where knowledge gaps were identified and trained staffs were monitored to ensure that the gaps were actually closed. Communication was encouraged between Retail, FAN and the centralized processing teams to address issues that needed clarification.

The procedures were fine-tuned until the teams were able to process all new orders within the period stipulated in the SLA.

The new system of order processing was then applied to the other exchanges in the country.

AN ANALYSIS OF THE DECISION-MAKING PROCESS-COMPARED WITH SIMON’S PHASES

According to Simon (1977), the first phase of the decision making process is the Intelligence phase. This involves scanning of the environment continuously or intermittently using a set of search procedures to gather data about the environment based on the objectives set by the business. Relevant data is gathered about the environment to determine the actual situation. This data is then compared with the desired or expected situation. The difference between the actual and the expected outcome is the problem. Problems can be classified according to their level of structuredness. The problem owners are identified; these are individuals or teams that have the responsibility of taking decisions on the operations of the units under consideration. The outcome of the Intelligence phase is a formal problem statement.

From the interview, it was clear that there was an objective set by Vodafone Fixed Services on the number of days that should be used to complete the provision of new ADSL services, i.e. 7 (seven) days. The fixed services unit used computer-based query systems to collect data from service provisioning applications software used by the teams. These query systems provide data on activities performed by staffs that process customer orders. These were the scanning procedures and data collection methods applied. They provided relevant data needed to compare the actual situation with the desired results. A problem was identified when it was realized that the new ADSL installations were taking on the average, 28 working days to complete. This was a problem because there was a huge difference between the actual situation and the expected. The problem was of a structured nature because it had to do with daily operational processes. The problem owners were identified, i.e. the Retail operations team, the Fixed Services Management team and the Quality Assurance team. They collectively agreed that there was a problem and came up with a problem statement.

The second phase of Simon’s decision making process is the Design phase. This involves formulation of a model, setting criteria for choice, searching for alternatives, and prediction and measurement of outcomes. A model is a simplified representation of reality. The model is constructed, validated and tested. Different types of models can be constructed based on the real life situation. Alternatives are generated from the model. The various alternatives are weighed according to their outcomes, by measurement (Simon 1977).

From my interview with the Head of Fixed Services, conceptual modeling was not actually used in the design phase. The problem owners decided to use experimentation by choosing an exchange that met their criteria i.e. customer base, number of Retail and FAN staff, amount of resources available to the teams (technology, logistics, information systems, etc), average number of requests for new ADSL connections per day and fault incidence rate. The team came up with alternatives by sharing of ideas, analysis of processes and brainstorming.

The third phase of Simon’s decision making process is the Choice Phase. This involves choosing the best of the alternatives to solve the problem. The alternatives are verified and tested in the real world to ascertain their ability to solve the problem. The best alternative is chosen, after which there is planning for implementation (Simon 1977)

The interview revealed that during the choice phase, experimentation was done on the two alternatives that the team came up with. The second alternative was a better alternative after the experimentation process, so it was chosen. The team prepared for implementation by fine-tuning the processes in the chosen alternative until data collected showed that the actual results were the same as the expected results.

The fourth stage in Simon’s decision making process is the Implementation Phase which is an active process of putting the solution to work. It requires consistent change management in making the solution work (Simon 1977).

From the interview, as indicated in the earlier; the problem owners had challenges with the implementation of the new approach. A lot of data was collected over the trial period. The retail and FAN teams initially had challenges with the new procedures put in place to ensure the smooth running of the new setup. The problem owners had to constantly communicate the new changes to the frontlines to ensure total compliance. There was constant feedback from the problem owners to the frontlines based on data collected from the order processing application software. The feedback was to encourage frontlines to follow the new guidelines and also to identify peculiar challenges that staffs were facing. Training was done where knowledge gaps were identified and trained staffs were monitored to ensure that the gaps were actually closed. Communication was encouraged between Retail, FAN and the centralized processing teams to address issues that needed clarification. The procedures were fine-tuned until the teams were able to process all new orders within the period stipulated in the SLA.

CONCLUSION

The analysis shows that the decision taken by the problem owners went through the phases in Simon’s decision-taking steps. At the design phase, the team did not construct a conceptual model to represent the real life problem but rather used experimentation. The team was able to take a decision out of two alternatives and implemented the chosen alternative. The implementation was challenging, but the team was able to achieve their objective.