BIRMINGHAM CITY BUSINESS SCHOOL

BA (Hons) Business & Management

Coursework Cover Sheet

Module title: Management Consultancy Project

Module code: MAN6010

Module tutor: Martin Hipkiss / Geoff Stanley

Date: 25th April 2016

Assignment type: Group report

Word Count: 7,270 words

Student name: Student number:

Akshay Kanda 13154014

Dayna Vekaria 13151548

Dhijay V. Patel 13156176

Edilaine D. Santos 12778522

Fiona I. Ifeozo 13158568

Lewis T. J. Gardner 13185440

Ming Chi Wong 14139875

Mohammad F. Kaleem 13187473

Nikhil Shah 13158027

Report of

Customer Service Hubs Project

April 2016

Abstract

The purpose of this report is to show how Connect Consultancy consulted with

Birmingham City council to help solve a number of issues within the organisation.

The main issues that will be discussed in this report are the problems surrounding

how Birmingham City Council's housing department, firstly how they can improve

their internal and external communication. Secondly, improving the customer

journey/ satisfaction of BCC's housing tenants. Finally, identifying whether utilizing

social media will decrease demand. We will discuss in detail the different types of

research methods used such as focus group meetings with current tenants and also

visiting the customer service hubs. Furthermore, this

report discusses the different stages of the

consultancy cycle. Based on the research gathered,

the report will be concluded by stating the most

appropriate solutions to the problems presented. At

Prepared by:

the end of this report is the appendices containing all relevant data.

Table of Contents

Abstract..................................................................................................................... v

Table of Contents.....................................................................................................vi

1. Introduction........................................................................................................1

1.1. Meet the team..............................................................................................................1

1.2. Client background........................................................................................................2

1.3. Scope of the project.....................................................................................................2

1.4. Methodology.................................................................................................................3

2. Consultancy Cycle.............................................................................................4

2.1 Gaining entry................................................................................................................5

2.2 Contracting...................................................................................................................6

2.3 Collecting Data.............................................................................................................9

2.4 Analysing Data...........................................................................................................15

2.5 Generating Options....................................................................................................25

2.6 Disengaging...............................................................................................................30

3. Conclusion.......................................................................................................33

References...............................................................................................................34

List of Appendices......................................................................................................

1. Introduction

This Management Consultancy Project is part of the undergraduate programme at

Birmingham City University. Participants of the project serve as consultants to work

with external client organisation for fostering greater learning experience through the

integration of theories and practices.

1.1. Meet the team

Connect Consultancy is formed in association to the project, which gathered nine

individuals to work together towards being a trusted team of consultants whilst

focusing on different business areas. The team members include:

Akshay Kanda – Studying Business and Management

Dayna Vekaria – Studying Business and Management

Dhijay V. Patel – Studying Business and Management

Edilaine D. Santos – Studying Business and Human Resource Management

Fiona I. Ifeozo – Studying Business and Economics

Lewis T. J. Gardner – Studying Business and Economics

Ming Chi Wong – Studying Business and Management

Mohammad F. Kaleem – Studying Economics and Finance

Nikhil Shah – Studying Business and Management

Detailed profiles can be found in Appendix 2.

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1.2. Client background

The client of this consultation project is Birmingham City Council, precisely the

housing services which is managed by the Place Directorate. The council is the

largest single provider of social housing in the country (Birmingham City Council,

2014a). There are 3 customer service centres providing support and services to

over 63 thousand council property tenants in the whole city as of April 2014

(Birmingham City Council, 2014b):

East & North centre (located in Lea Hall) – serves Yardley, Hall Green and

Hodge Hill districts

West & Central centre (located in Ladywood) – serves Ladywood,

Erdington, Perry Barr and Sutton Coldfield districts

South centre (located in Longbridge) – serves Edgbaston, Northfield, Selly

Oak and Kings Norton districts

Currently, council tenants mainly contact the housing team by telephone. There

are additional methods of communication presented online via Birmingham City

Council's, promoted by Mrs Barbara Nice (Birmingham City Council, ca. 2013).

1.3. Scope of the project

The project is aimed to improve customer satisfaction in relation to the tenants of

Birmingham City Council. The two main focal points are:

1. Evaluate the current customer service journey alongside measuring levels

of satisfaction

2. Evaluate whether a channel shift and the use of social media (Twitter,

YouTube etc.) can improve communication between the council and their

tenants. Additionally, asses whether this shift will reduce demand

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1.4. Methodology

The consultancy team engaged meetings with staff of the client organisation as

the main approach for consulting. For data collection, both primary and

secondary researches were carried out. The team performed visits to all 3

customer service centres for an overview of the current workflow and viewpoints

from front line employees. Besides, a focus group has been organised for

insights from tenants regarding the housing services. Studies on other housing

service organisations have been done for further contextual facts about the

market and benchmarking. The analysis of all findings are detailed in this report,

along with established suggestions for the council as moving forward with this

project.

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2. Consultancy Cycle

The traditional approach used to commence a consulting project is the consultancy

cycle. There are a variety of interpretations of the model, but it commonly consists of

seven stages, shown in below Figure 1:

Figure 1 - Consultancy Cycle

The model is developed in a cyclical form, since consultants may require to return to

an earlier stage, for example, further data must be gathered in order to move into the

data analysis stage. For the nature of this consulting project, the implementation

stage has been left out. Therefore, it will not be discussed in this report.

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2.1 Gaining entry

Entry is the first phase of the consultancy cycle, which is the initial point of

contact with the client. Creating a positive first impression is important, as

achieving this in the first stage is vital for the consulting process. As a consultant

a sufficient time frame should be designated for the entry phase with the client.

The main objective of this stage is for the consultant(s) and client to become

introduced to one another, in order to develop an effective working relationship

with openness, trust and honesty. During this stage, consultant and client should

discuss the issues for a clear understanding of the problem and mutual

expectations, this avoids time wasting through working in the wrong direction

resulting in inappropriate solutions being presented (Cockman et al, 1999;

Wickham and Wilcock, 2012). However, consultants can easily concentrate on

building a strong mutual trust with the client for too long therefore failing to

consider the significance of the project presented.

Having considered the importance of the entry stage, contact was initiated soon

after the project brief was received. This was conducted via email. The first

meeting for Connect Consultancy to meet the client was held on 11 th February

2016. Regrettably one team member was unable to join the first meeting, which

affected the overall first impression of the team. During the meeting the client

presented relevant background information, such as the general structure of the

housing team, basics surrounding the operations, and outlined the problematic

areas stated in the brief. The team initiated conversations surrounding the

mutual expectations of the consulting project mentioned in the previous section –

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scope of the project. Overall, the meeting ran smoothly, with positive interactions

throughout. High levels of professionalism was displayed and maintained by all

members of Connect Consultancy as a positive relationship with the client was

established. Due to time constraints, the time spent on this stage was limited.

2.2 Contracting

A contract is defined as a ‘voluntary, deliberate, and legally binding agreement

between two or more competent parties.’ With a contract, the contractor (us) and

the client are both protected. This ensures that the both parties involved

understand what is desired from one another therefore minimising potential

conflict arising from miscommunication.

In order to develop a detailed and accurate contract, the task needed to be

clarified. Prior to the first meeting, we decided to evaluate and discuss the issues

presented in the project brief. These were not discussed in detail to avoid biased

solutions being applied to the basic description of the issue. There were many

constraints regarding this project. Firstly, there was a time constraint as the

project had to be completed by 25th April 2016 at 12 noon. Therefore, the data

had to be collected, analysed and a solution(s) had to be devised. It was

important that a group contract was created to ensure that each member was

obligated to behave in a professional manner at all times. We identified the

importance of team work and applied Bruce Tuckman's (1965) theory. This

theory consists of four stages – forming, storming, norming and, performing

(Reynolds, 2009). During the forming stage we agreed on the mutual goals

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surrounding the project. This is confirmed in one of our group rules, "we shall

work together on the assignment".

As previously stated contact was then initiated with our client to organise our first

meeting. As consultants we expressed our desire to help others through

providing solutions, these feelings were reciprocated by our client. We therefore

decided to implement the process consultation/collaborative consultancy style.

This is because "each party sees that they have expertise and experience that

will be of value in joint problem-solving and diagnosis" (Kenton and Moody,

2003). In this meeting an oral contract was made based on the mutual

expectations of this project. An oral contract is not reliable as the agreement

made can be denied. Therefore, a client contract was devised which outlined

what Connect Consultancy were offering and what is to be expected of us. The

headings 'ownership of IP & confidentiality' states that all research gathered is

solely the property of our client ensuring that the data is meeting the

requirements of the Data Protection Act (1998). This meant that as consultants

we had no ownership of our research. Our client agreed with this document as it

was signed by himself, and all of Connect Consultancy.

Furthermore, we have stated that the agreement can be terminated if we or the

client breech any terms of the contract. This also relates to any unachieved

expectations. We had included this as we felt a reliable contract ‘should clearly

set out the process surrounding termination involving how it should be handled

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and the 'ideal' way to inform the other party. The contract can be terminated

immediately (within reason) or with notice.

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2.3 Collecting Data

This section is devoted to the discussion regarding the methods implemented

during the collection of data, the procedure, followed by the analysis of all

relevant data gathered. The method of data collection is dependant on the

organisation. In order to provide robust recommendations to Birmingham City

Council’s housing department both primary and secondary research were

accumulated. Primary research involves collecting data that is original in nature

as it is “collected to address a specific problem” (Wiid and Diggines, 2009). This

was gathered during one to one interviews conducted at the three customer

service hubs and an organised focus group. On the other hand, secondary

research involves applying existing data that was previously collected for a

different purpose to the current project. This was gathered via research done on

the Birmingham City Council website, and other local council websites.

In order to increase the reliability and feasibility of this data - multiple methods

(qualitative and quantitative approaches) were incorporated, known as

triangulation (Denzin, 2009). Therefore, this counterbalances the weaknesses

associated with each method (Axinn and Pearce, 2006). Foremost, qualitative

data traditionally consists of two broad approaches: observation and interviews.

This method was enforced to gain an understanding of the issues presented in

the project brief provided by the client. Quantitative information traditionally

focuses on gathering numerical data to determine the relationship between an

independent variable and another outcome variable. In relation to Birmingham

City housing department, Connect Consultancy aimed to identify whether

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increasing the client’s presence on social media would reduce in a decline of

calls received by each hub.

Hub Visit

As previously stated Birmingham City Council housing department have three

customer service centres: East & North centre (located in Lea Hall), West &

Central centre (located in Ladywood), and the South centre (located in

Longbridge). The project brief mentions the issue surrounding the hubs, the

issue was later confirmed to be based on the number of calls received by each

hub. Currently despite being the smallest centre, the south hub receives the

most calls. In order to provide a recommendation, a questionnaire (see Appendix

7) was created consisting of eleven open and closed questions. The objective of

producing this questionnaire was to determine why a large number of tenants

call the centre as opposed to visiting the organisation's website.

Connect Consultancy purposefully divided into three subgroups to ensure that all

of the hubs were visited. These visits occurred on 25 th February & 03rd March

2016 and each lasted for four hours. The first set of data was collected via a

naturalistic observation upon entering the hubs, this was to get a brief

understanding of the work ethic and culture. A naturalistic observation involves

assessing the “spontaneous behaviour of participants in natural surroundings”

(McLeod, 2015). The results of the observations were initially recorded in a note

format then transferred into a table shown below Table 1.

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Table 1 - Observation results

East & North

centre

Warmly welcomed upon arrival

Dynamic environment; sunlight alongside highly lit room.

Calm atmosphere (evident that it is not a busy day), well

divided working environments

Staff: Some uneasy, advanced in age

West & central

centre

Warmly welcomed upon arrival

Only four members of staff

South centre Warmly welcomed upon arrival

Age range of staff 30 – 60+

Prior to the interview process, each member of Connect Consultancy briefly

disclosed the importance of confidentiality with each member of staff that was

being interviewed. Following this, each interviewee was given the option of

anonymity. Once a mutual agreement was decided, the interview proceeded. In

order to avoid biased information being given, an acceptant intervention style

was adopted which involved actively listening so that emotions that would have

previously prevented an honest answer are minimised/eradicated. Both

managers and staff were interviewed to ensure reliable and representative data

was collected.

The duration of interviews was approximately ten minutes. The interview process

was slightly unstructured. This is because the questions were pre-designed but

were also flexible as a ‘comfort zone’ was created. The data collected for each

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hub is shown in the appendices. As consultants, we embraced a professional

demeanour and attitude to all issues presented.

Reappearing similarities of data collected from each hub are as follows:

The busiest days are Monday and Tuesday

The communication between tenants and employees can be improved

The systems Northgate and CRM to not ‘interact’ therefore complications

such as crashes have drastic consequences

Communication between the hub & back office does not always run

smoothly

Culture of resistance

Other Primary research

Primary data was collected from Ongo (see Appendix 7) as they were awarded

Customer Service Contact Centre of the year in 2015. Upon visiting their

website, the contact information and social media links were easily visible,

located at the bottom of each screen therefore making it easily accessible to

customers. They also made their website more user friendly by giving the option

to enlarge the text and also transform the visible information into audible text.

After making contact with the organisation it was identified that the strategy

behind their success is to have less than 20 per cent of calls transferred to other

staff. To do this, employee is trained to handle all types of complaints that they

may receive, by doing this, customer complaints are dealt with quickly therefore

minimising the frustration linked to lengthy customer journeys. This is a strategy

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that Birmingham City Council should consider implementing, as a large number

of calls that are received are not necessary.

Secondary research

Secondary research was conducted to provide supporting data that could be

used to strengthen the recommendations provided to the client. The aim was to

collect data based on ways to improve the accessibility of the housing

department, improve communication between the department and customers

alongside incorporating social media to reduce demand. Research was

conducted on the Birmingham City Council website, as during our first meeting

with our client it was discussed that the main reason why the customer service

hubs receive so many calls is because it is hard for tenants to navigate around

the website. Further research was collected on the other four main councils in

the West Midlands also know as the "super councils" (see Appendix 7). The

findings show that on average it takes two more clicks to find the housing team’s

contact page than it does for other housing organisations in the West Midlands.

A telephone interview with the Liverpool Housing Trust was scheduled as they

were previously awarded with the best customer service for a housing trust. This

would have provided supportive data on how to improve the customer service

and develop a more user friendly website. However, it has not been possible to

conduct the telephone interview due to communication issues with the

organisation. However, a telephone interview was successfully conducted with

Solihull Council. The aim of this was to collect data regarding the positives and

negatives of opening their customer service centre on a Saturday, as many

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working class people do not have time to contact them during the week.

However, it was also identified that despite opening on a Saturday, they were

unable to reduce the number of calls received on a Monday.

This positively correlates with the data collected from visits to customer service

hubs, were employees identified the busiest days as Mondays and Tuesdays.

Data collected on Wolverhampton Council’s website showed how they utilize

social media as a method of communication. They have a Facebook Page and

Twitter with over five-thousand follows were they provide updates and advice

regarding housing information. Additionally, Sandwell and Walsall Council also

utilize social media as method of communication.

Focus groups

Due to external circumstances it was difficult to organise the focus group, Arthur

was absent and the Easter holiday prolonged the meeting until 14 th April 2016.

As this was close to our module deadlines unfortunately only two group

members were able to attend. The focus group was attended by five of the

tenants (their names are withheld for confidentiality reasons), Arthur Tsang and

Hilary Davies (East & North hub manager). With the permission of all involved,

the focus group was also audibly recorded and some pictures were taken (see

Appendix 7). Questions were asked on the current service provided by the

council followed by how the process could be improved.

The key points raised revolved around communication issues with the tenants,

people were confused about what services the customers service hubs provide

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and say the council website provides conflicting and confusing information. The

customer journey is made frustrating as customers continuously report being

passed around and sent between departments, which raises internal concern

that staff are not trained enough. There was also a general consensus that the

service hubs take too long to process and respond to tenant enquiries. Further

improvements included improving communication and information access shared

with the tenants, which could be done by reducing and simplifying contact

methods and websites. Support for social media use was strong as a way to

improve customer services, however further concerns were raised regarding

some tenants not being computer literate.

In order to provide the best recommendations to our client we believed it was

important to conduct both primary and secondary research to provide broader

perspectives in order to strengthen our conclusion. Additionally, we were able to

gather useful qualitative and quantitative data through our visits to customer

service hubs, focus group meetings and research done on Birmingham City

Council as well as other local housing organisations. This data will be further

analysed in the section below.

2.4 Analysing Data

During our consultancy project, we gathered various amounts of data in order to

understand the issues of the client in detail. Interpretations and critical analysis

of the data we have collected provided our team with the applicable knowledge

required to begin generating ideas for the client. At this stage of the consultancy

cycle, we have been able to gather data through primary research such as

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visiting customer service hubs, conducting a focus group, meetings with the

client and a phone call interview with a local housing authority. Secondary

research on other local councils/authorities has also been completed. The

research gathered provided interlinking yet significant information that our

consultancy team have analysed.

Primary Research

Customer Service Hubs

Analysing the data gathered from visiting the three BCC customer service hubs for

housing enquiries was of significance. Our consultancy team produced three 3

reports respective to each hub to record and analyse the data gathered,

(Appendix 7.8, 7.9, 7.10).

A key consideration we discovered from analysing the data we gathered from

visiting the customer service hubs was the concerns staff had with their main data

recording systems, CRM and Northgate. All the staff clearly stated their

preference for Northgate. This is due to the longevity of the process of recording

calls with CRM. They believed CRM to not be specifically designed or adjusted to

the needs of the hub. Furthermore staff considered CRM to not be user friendly as

there are a vast amount of screens and data to record. From our analysis,

although Northgate could just be used to lessen confusion for staff, it could be

suggested staff may require further knowledge of how to operate CRM and may

need to familiarise themselves with the data recording system through training.

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The housing tenants of BCC may suffer as the delay in solving the issue may

increase and this could then negatively impact the relationship between the

housing tenants of BCC and BCC. ‘A training initiative helps to boost customer

service and improve customer relations’, (Human Resource Management

International Digest, 2008). Similarly, (Paajanen, 1997) proposes ‘good customer

service rests on three pillars; the right employees, sound practices and training.

Training is often the first step companies take to improve customer service’. Staff

may then possess the depth and understanding to use CRM more effectively as

‘CRM enhances promotion through adding effective C2B communication facilities’

(IGI Global, 2016) which would improve workflow and enhance customer

satisfaction.

In terms of a channel shift and the use of forms of social media, the staff

responded with mixed reviews. The staff were both in favour and against the use

of social media. Those who were in favour of social media suggested an increase

in the use of forms such as Twitter. Skype etc. to enable better communication

with tenants more suited for current times. ‘As your customers move to other

forms of media, it is your job to stay ahead of the curve and be where they are’,

(Beard, 2016). Better communication leads to a more positive employee-customer

relationship as it ‘prevents misunderstandings’ (Dolphin, 2009) from occurring.

This may lead to a reduction in demand as a decline in the amount of calls

received by the hubs will be visible as customers are better informed and

consequently the main housing issues can be resolved by the hubs while the

quicker more straight forward issues are resolved without calling.

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In contrast, those opposing the use of social media indicated the potential for

customers to become over reliant on it. Specifically, staff emphasised social

media being used more and targeted towards the younger generation as the

elderly and those who don’t speak English as their first language may struggle.

‘Many seniors have physical conditions or health issues that make it difficult to use

new technologies. Around two in five seniors indicate that they have a physical or

health condition that makes reading difficult or challenging’ (Smith, 2014). This

may prove detrimental in reducing demand as those who struggle to use social

media will still call in. A shift in culture may be needed to allow BCC to apply a 21 st

century approach. Additionally staff stated tenants prefer interacting with an

employee over the phone as the majority of their housing tenants are of the

elderly persuasion. ‘It is known, that close customer interactions help increase

customer satisfaction as a crucial antecedent of customer loyalty’ (Bellingkrodt,

2015).

Lastly, we found that there seems to be a distant relationship between the hubs

and the back office teams. The staff we questioned believed there to be a lack of

knowledge and understanding from staff in regards to what issues were of

relevance to their department and with little interaction between the two, issues

such as miscommunication and duplication of data occurs. There was a significant

amount of calls to each of the hubs, particularly repair related calls that should not

have been transferred to the housing department hubs number, thus could have

been avoided or dealt with before hand by the appropriate employees.

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‘Organisations should strive to be transparent in regards to how they share

information internally’, (Vessella, 2016). ‘Any kind of misunderstanding in the

workplace, big or small, always has a negative effect on the company’,

(Speedupcareer, 2016). This may cause substantial challenges for the staff at the

hubs as it leads to an influx of calls that should not be for the hub, hence there are

more calls to be passed back to the repairs department leading to a time

consuming cycle, negatively effecting the customer journey whilst increasing

demand. As mentioned above, re-educating staff in terms of additional training

about their roles may be required.

Focus Groups

A report was produced following the focus group conducted with tenants from

BCC, (Appendix 7.12), in order to analyse the data gathered. Due to time

limitations, only one of the possible two focus groups were conducted before the

deadline of this report. The tenants highlighted their concerns with the website.

The tenants stated that there was too much information on the pages and too

many clicks were required to reach the relevant information. Furthermore, they

added that there were too many numbers for different departments and that all the

numbers seem to end up going to the same department. BCC may consider

redesigning their website and service to ensure the highest possible efficiency and

customer satisfaction is met. Yola suggests two significant considerations when

considering the design of a website. The main two steps are to create a strong

and clear message as well as having easy navigations. These are imperative as,

‘your website is your best chance of making a lasting impression to your

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customer’, (Yola, 2013). Ultimately, this may create the foundation for BCC and

their tenants to engage in a more productive, healthy relationship thus allowing

customer journey to improve whilst lowering demand.

If this can be implemented successfully, re-educating the tenants of BCC of where

and how to access information may be essential in reducing demand. It could be

suggested, each organisation will have their own demand profile and this

uniqueness means that the causes of avoidable contacts are varied. In terms of

making information available online simple and accessible, customer education

comes to forefront, (CCA, 2012).

Although, from analysing the data gathered from hubs provided insight into the

influx of repair calls that should not be for the customer service housing hubs.

Also, some staff may require further knowledge of what issues were of relevance

to their department, the tenants of BCC could also require further knowledge of

what number and options to choose when calling in. There is a misconception that

the housing customer service hubs and the repairs contact centre are one. This

led to tenants being passed around from department to department causing

lengthy resolutions for BCC’s tenants. Again, re-educating the tenants of BCC

may be essential. When considering the value creation model, (figure 2),

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, choosing value involves understanding the customer’s needs to focus priorities.

Delivering value involves determining what business improvements will deliver

greatest value to tenants. It is then vital to communicate value to educate the

market.

When re-educating BCC’s tenants, a channel shift and use of social media may

be effective. The tenants questioned from the focus group specified their general

support for the use of social media as a means to improve the customer service

experience. Informing tenants consistently with relevant information allows BCC’s

tenants to ‘share those interests, or who just want to stay informed, can read

these stories and share them as well.’ (Jackson, 2016). As a result, demand may

decrease, however it was stated that tenants who struggle to have access to new

technologies and those who do not wish to ask personal questions through a

social media platform may be reluctant to engage and thus demand in calls may

not alter.

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Ongo Phone Call Interview

Conducting a phone call interview with Ongo (housing authority) was highly

beneficial in understanding the route which they taken and adapted. A report was

produced in order to analyse the data gathered from the conversation, (Appendix

7.11). The key considerations to be made from analysing this are the efficiency of

their website, the feedback systems in place to achieve the high customer

satisfaction and their ability to implement social media platforms. Feedback was

stated to be of major importance in order to have high customer satisfaction

levels. There are certain methods of measuring customer satisfaction, (Figure 3),

one is a theoretical or conceptual approach. This method, ‘directly measures on

customer feedback’, (Akbari et al, 2013). BCC currently operate on a passive

feedback type as they rely on complaints as their only form of improving the

organisation. ‘Customer feedback collection tools can be generally categorized

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into two types, active and passive’, (Wirtz, 2010). However, Ongo use more of an

active feedback system as their customer feedback is based on surveys and

questionnaires. Therefore a more active approach for feedback would be

beneficial to BCC as it would improve the customer journey by highlighting issues

arisen. The use of social media in Ongo is clearly advertised throughout their

website. ‘Many local authorities have already spotted that increasing use of social

media allows them to reduce costs by moving to more cost effective channels

whilst actually improving their customers experience’, (BDO, 2016). As well as

increasing awareness of new information to customers on social media it will also

enable cost reductions and continue to improve on customer journeys.

Secondary Research

Other local Housing Councils/Authorities

Relating to information collected, connect consultancy used secondary research

to differentiate Birmingham city council’s website to other local council’s websites

which was done to compare the difference in the ways councils innovate their

website pages and bench mark these services against BCC. “Secondary research

data once obtained, this data can be further analysed to provide additional or

different knowledge, interpretation or conclusions” (Bulmer et al, 2009). Thus,

during the second research, it was obvious that Birmingham city council may need

to update their home page. Solihull Council’s home page is more user friendly,

welcoming and more innovative, thus making it simpler for customers to access as

opposed to BCC as their page is very informative making it difficult for anyone to

browse BCC’s home page. Moreover, Birmingham city council’s website could be

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updated constantly in order to fit modern generation. “Fear of obsolescence is

usually a greater incentive to invest in new technologies than the lure of

enhancement of existing offerings, (Chandy et al, 2003). Most businesses are

involved in social media as this is seemed as the fastest way to reach their

customers. This illustrates how some councils are already exploring the social

media app’s and taking into consideration how their customers are evolving

throughout technology beneficial to their housing tenants, a route BCC may opt to

undertake. BCC currently uses six different numbers that deals with all requests

which is time consuming and not cost effective. In addition, Coventry’s Councils

website offers a colourful home page with different options not just relating to their

services but any upcoming events to the city which offers diverse social media

options such as Flick, YouTube, Facebook and Twitter. It may be recommended

that Birmingham city council could improve their website into a more welcoming

home page format by changing the colours and using less information regarding

their services but with the necessary and use of more pleasant features.

Meetings with Client

Throughout the meetings with the client it was gathered that even though the

company does their best to meet their customer’s preferences, BCC’s housing

department may be implementing the incorrect methods to meet their goals and

objectives. However, certain aspects of the communication process can be

improved to minimise all concerns that have been brought forward such as the

use of verbal communication within workforce, staff social media, customer

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service, and the use of technological services. However, based on our data

collection all the information became even more intense.

From the meetings with our client we discussed scope of the project and the issue

of lack of communication within departments but also lack communication

between the council and their tenants. However, to improve such situation

internal communication needs to be stronger. “It is the correct design of the

structure which is of most significance in determining organisation performance.

(Drucker et al, 2005). BCC should prioritise and understand the benefits of

effective communication since this will help the company to focus on developing a

pleasant place for staff to work in as well as better production between them and

dealing with customers with professionalism. We also discussed the relevant

primary and secondary research required to address the client’s needs. The key

considerations for the client were the customer journey/satisfaction and

implementing a channel shift/ use of social media.

2.5 Generating Options

According to (Lee and Kozar, 2009) websites are the most important tool in the

communication process over the Internet from looking at BCC's website, they may

need to drastically improve their online website by hiring a professional website

designer in order to help them to restructure it. The reason for this is because

currently the website is really out of date compared to other councils in the local

district. The website needs to state clear information and can be quick to access,

(see appendices 6). Our team did a survey on how many clicks does it take to get

25

to finding a number for the housing department. Out of all the councils that we did

a research on, Birmingham City Council has the highest amount of clicks in order

to find the contact number. Most of the councils had a maximum of three or even

two clicks to get a contact number, where as Birmingham City council had more

than that. (See appendices 7) for how many each council had. The way that the

council will be able to implement improvements to their website is as we have said

before it needs a restructure and a complete design change. However another

important factor may be that the council needs to reduce the amount of numbers

they have on their website, if you look at appendices 8 Solihull Council has only

one number for their housing department and only one email address. By sticking

to one number this will not get tenants confused as to which department they

need to call.

The idea about Birmingham City Council using social media as another means of

communicate is a good idea to a certain existence (See Appendices 10).

Following the focus group meeting with tenants, a possibility for Birmingham City

Council may be that they could use social media to communicate with tenants by

informing them with information they may be unaware of. In addition to this a live

chat system can also be implemented on their website, as this would help to

reduce calls as sometimes people haven't got time to call and wait within a queue.

This would help to reduce demand within the contact centre.

An inbox system may be put into place which only one person should deal with,

this is so that if anyone decides to email instead of phone this can get picked up

26

very quickly, by doing this and keeping it to one individual person email,

responses will be made quicker.

‘Good communication is an essential tool in achieving productivity and maintaining

strong working relationships at all levels of an organization, (Page 2016). The

communication frailties within BCC’s housing department have created major

problems, this is because the research we constructed and analysed highlighted

why staff training within BCC’s housing department has to be improved. Staff

training plays a major role in helping employees ‘acquire new skills and sharpen

existing ones’ to help ‘increase productivity’ (Chopra, 2015) and 'is essential for an

organisation's success' (Today, 2016). As inadequate staff training is a problem

for the BCC’s housing department. They may want to look into their staff training

programs and consider the following improvement opportunities. They could

introduce a monthly or quarterly training program to help their staff members keep

up to date with new innovations in customer service methods. This is because

according to (Abbott, 2015), ‘regular training can have a really positive effect on

your team.’ Secondly they could utilise the staff training initiative used by Ongo.

Where as seen on appendix 8.1, the BCC’s housing department can use this

model to help them train there staff in all aspect of the department to help reduce

the number of irreverent calls and increase customer satisfaction.

In addition to this we found that staff members were having trouble using the new

CRM data collection system, which was recently added to the hubs. When

speaking to staff members at the hubs we unearthed that there was a very scarce

27

amount of training given in the use of the system and that many of the staff

members preferred using Northgate. BCC may consider discarding CRM and to

remain with Northgate as it will be beneficial in reducing costs and simplify the

data collection process for staff. However maintaining the CRM system BCC may

consider the CRM Database Management training program as show in appendix

8.2. This will help educate the staff in using the system and will reduce the

problems that have been occurring.

The main thing that was learnt from Ongo was that all the employees that answer

the phone are trained in all departments, that is a major problem for Birmingham

City Council as they have to pass the call to someone who is trained within that

certain department. According to C, Greenleaf (1998) "viewing employees as a

valuable investment is a necessary step in on-going improvement.." This is

something that Birmingham City Council needs to realise, as this is clearly a big

issue, as all the calls are not fully completed. Birmingham City Council needs to

train all their staff in every department; this would help with the number of calls

that can get resolved on the spot. Furthermore according to W, Rahman & Z, Nas

"when organisations provide training to its employees, it helps them in their career

development...[with their] sense of advancement and skills lead to increased

productivity.." This is what BCC needs to get out of their employees but they can

only do that once they have given them to necessary training. BCC should think of

getting an external expert in to help train the employees to the highest standards.

(See Appendices 9)

28

Lastly there is a great importance in feedback as according to Beard (2014) ‘it

provides marketers and business owners with insight that they can use to improve

their business and overall customer experience. The BCC’s housing department

as acknowledged before have no Feedback system in place, this has created

barriers for the Council as they don’t know if their current service is good, if the

customers are happy with the service and whether there are any improvements to

make. This demonstrates the significance of a feedback system. The BCC could

use the following company Voluntas to help them build a feedback system and

guide them through the effective Feedback Cycle as shown in Figure 4.

. This company has delivered 'insightful and actionable business intelligence'

(Voluntas, 2016) to many businesses including Ongo the award winners for

customer satisfaction as seen on appendix 8.4. The BCC's housing department

can use Voluntas 'Customer Insight' program to help them gain a better look into

the customers need and according make the necessary improvements, this in turn

29

will create the platform in helping BCC increase customer satisfaction and reduce

demand.

In addition to this the BCC could look into incorporating live chat onto their website

this will allow customers to chat with the council in real-time to ask questions, get

advice and 'add a human factor to your website, allowing your business to tell its

story and solve customer issues all at once' (Honigman 2013). BCC can use

LiveHelpNow.net live chat system, as this is the number one rated live chat

system for the last five years as show on appendix 8.5. The live chat system is

cost effective as this offers many features that can aid the council such as 'Social

Insights', where you can connect too tenants through social media, mobile phone

(text and e-mail). They also offer training and free demo on use and features of

the system. So the implementation process will be made simpler.

2.6 Disengaging

Disengagement is the final stage of the consultancy cycle and “refers to the

ending of the consultation or collaboration relationship” (Dougherty and

Dougherty, 2009). It is aimed to evaluate the consultation process by confirming

all expectations have been reached. The timing of disengagement varies

between consultancy projects; Connect Consultancy is currently in the process

of disengaging. In order to maintain a healthy relationship with our client, it was

mutually agreed that this process would not be rushed. The checklist (see below

Figure 5) suggested by Cockman et al, which involves steps to ensure a

successful disengagement process, was used as a guideline.

30

Figure 2 – Checklist (Crowther, 2009)

Implementing this checklist involves assessing the beginning (each stage of the

consultancy cycle) in order to prosperously assess the end (disengagement).

During the entry stage Connect Consultancy discussed the time frame available

with our client, also mentioning how the disengagement stage will occur.

Naturally, a period of reduced involvement occurred during the analysis of data

stage, which was comfortable with. As we are yet to disengage it is difficult to

discuss the process. However, a plan to successfully disengage has been

outlined below. Once this plan is put into action there may be some

disagreement about how the process is handled therefore negotiating and

compromising may take place.

Connect Consultancy's plan to disengage

1. Reduce involvement

31

2. Evaluate: Connect Consultancy will discuss and evaluate the consultation

process alongside our client [Arthur]

3. Post consultation: In order to reduce the gap caused by disengaging,

Connect Consultancy suggest that Birmingham City Council customer

service/housing department should assign different members of staff to

adopt a similar role of a consultant

4. A presentation of our findings will be presented to Arthur and his team.

5. The possibility of publication regarding the findings and recommendations

will be confirmed

6. Follow up: Receive feedback on the consulting process from our client

7. Termination: Verbally express our gratitude, followed up by a brief farewell

email encouraging our client to continue their growth”

To summarise, as the importance of this stage has been identified, a plan has

been devised to ensure that disengaging from our client will occur

smoothly.

32

3. Conclusion

The consultancy project we have undertaken with Birmingham City Council

has been insightful in allowing Connect Consultancy to develop our

understanding and knowledge of the nature of consultancy. We have been

able to successfully follow the steps of the consultancy cycle, although

generating ideas wasn’t completed and implementation of these possible

ideas could not begin due to time limitations we were able provide a

professional, efficient service to our client. The task, which has been

presented to our consultancy team, has been both challenging and

intellectually stimulating. From carrying out this report, underpinned with

appropriate evidence, theory and literature, meeting with our client and

gathering our primary and secondary research, we have come up with

appropriate solutions tailored to the clients needs. We believe, BCC must take

appropriate action in order to provide the most efficient service to their tenants

as well as enhancing productivity. Redesigning the website, training all staff

on aspects of the business, the use of social media to enable better

communication with tenants and to inform tenants of information on the go

and need for feedback to improve customer satisfaction have been highlighted

as key solutions for our client. In terms of addressing the concerns of the

customer journey and channel shift/ use of social media for BCC, we at

Connect Consultancy believe if these solutions can be implemented, BCC and

the housing tenants of BCC may see the direct positive results in reducing

demand and improving customer satisfaction as a result.

33

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