production-line approach to service Flashcards
field vs factory: service work
working out of field or front line workers
working with someone else (client)
performed because they want to or are forced
-high status (professionals) driven to help people
-lower status (sales) doing it cause its flexible (good for students)
Solutions: involve the performer of services
field vs factory: manufacturing or blue collar workers
shop floor workers, employees not managers or supervisors
improving tools, skills, for processes and arrangements
thinking of the means of production
solutions for manufacturing involve the tasks themselves
What does Levitt suggest
Focus on the worker, and what can we do to motivate them
Commission
Changing the performance of the employee
Different from manufacturing – we don’t look at the workers, we look at the work process (the tasks, how can we make them more efficient and organize them more differently)
the technocratic hamburger
ex: fast food industry
MacDonalds success due to the rapid delivery of a uniform high quality of food in a clean, orderly and cheerful setting
highly controlled not much discretion each step has timing associated with it scripts standard discretionary responses time demands appearance
Fries
specialized tools
served properly
fast clean reliable
red and yellow are colors that make you want to eat
machines anyone can learn how to do
challenges
limited view of the product (revlon)
“in the store we sell hope”
Service industries often think of themselves as offering services rather than manufacturing products and
manufacturing products and manufacturing companies often fail to think about customer service as integral to their products
Conclusions
to improve the quality and efficiency of services, we need to look beyond the performance of individual service workers
- looking at burnouts, the first response - you need to cope better
- the remedy is targeted at the employees themselves
the structure of their work needs to be changed - rather than blaming the victims, there might need to be organizational change
Taylorism and health care
They were spending more time looking for their tools than they actually spent on surgery
Figure out a more efficient way to find their tools
Rolled up in fabric – every surgery procedure you get a different tool set
Scientific management
Time and motion studies in hospitals
gps tracker, or researcher following around, or step counter - how long it takes workers to do their job in hospitals
Vocera - hands free communication device, idea that it would reduce the amount of time that nurses would have to find others
issues: hard to understands, voice recognition, and enunciation
how nurses spend their time
primary caregivers in hospitals
increasing the efficiency and effectiveness of nursing care is essential to hospital functioning and patient care
how much time they are directly spending with that patient
nurses spend 77% of their time in nursing practice (documentation, medication, admin, care coordination)
19% of nursing practice is spent in direct patient care activities
recommendations were Made to improve efficiency and safe delivery of patient care
Proportion of workers in the service industry today
75%
