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- All HBS Web (463)
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Managing Service Operations - MBA Elective Curriculum
By: Ryan W. Buell
World-class service organizations deeply understand the needs and behaviors of their customers, and design, manage, and improve their operating models accordingly. This course investigates the distinct challenges inherent in leading service operations, which make up... View Details
- 18 Nov 2009
- HBS Case
Customer Feedback Not on elBulli’s Menu
He's been called "the Salvador Dalí of the kitchen" for creations ranging from beetroot and yogurt ice-cream lollipops to a deconstructed Spanish omelet served in a parfait glass. Each year, some 2 million hopeful diners vie to be one of the fifty View Details
- May 2011
- Article
Think Customers Hate Waiting? Not So Fast...
By: Ryan W. Buell and Michael I. Norton
Managers typically look for ways to reduce wait time to increase customer satisfaction. New research suggests there's a better approach: showing customers a representation of the effort, whether literal or not, being expended on their behalf while they wait. (The... View Details
Keywords: Customer Relationship Management; Service Delivery; Consumer Behavior; Performance Effectiveness; Customer Satisfaction
Buell, Ryan W., and Michael I. Norton. "Think Customers Hate Waiting? Not So Fast..." Harvard Business Review 89, no. 5 (May 2011).
- 1991
- Article
Job Satisfaction, Service Capability and Customer Satisfaction: An Examination of Linkages and Management Implications
By: Leonard A. Schlesinger and Jeffrey Zornitsky
Survey data from 1,277 employees and 4,269 customers of a personal lines insurance organization were analyzed with the following results: (a) employee perceptions of service quality are positively related to both job satisfaction and self-perceived service capability;... View Details
Schlesinger, Leonard A., and Jeffrey Zornitsky. "Job Satisfaction, Service Capability and Customer Satisfaction: An Examination of Linkages and Management Implications." Human Resource Planning 14, no. 2 (1991): 141–149.
- 16 May 2011
- Research & Ideas
What Loyalty? High-End Customers are First to Flee
Satisfaction Buell's general research agenda considers how firm-level decisions affect customer actions and firm performance. He is continuing to collaborate with Campbell and Frei on a research project that... View Details
Keywords: by Julia Hanna
- 17 Sep 2001
- Research & Ideas
Let Customers Call the Shots
technologies could be used to create a captive one-to-one relationship between firms and consumers, so that customers could literally be viewed as assets. We should start to realize that things are not that simple. Ultimately, a... View Details
Keywords: by Martha Lagace
- 2014
- Chapter
Customer Experience and Service Design
By: Uday S. Karmarkar and Uma R. Karmarkar
While services already dominate economic activity in all major economies in the world, there has been curiously little investigation into many aspects of service management. For example, while product design and development have received a great deal of attention, the... View Details
Keywords: Service Design; Service Management; Product Design; Service Operations; Customer Satisfaction; Service Industry
Karmarkar, Uday S., and Uma R. Karmarkar. "Customer Experience and Service Design." Chap. 7 in Managing Consumer Services: Factory or Theater? edited by Enzo Baglieri and Uday Karmarkar, 109–130. Springer, 2014.
- 2009
- Chapter
Creating Superior Customer Value in a Connected World
By: Ranjay Gulati
"In the early twenty-first century, customers are more demanding than ever, and difficult economic times make them all the more so. As customers tighten their wallets and increase their demands, firms face greater pressure to provide superior customer value. Reducing... View Details
- 28 Feb 2022
- Research & Ideas
How Racial Bias Taints Customer Service: Evidence from 6,000 Hotels
terms of business outcomes, they're not developing the best customer relationships they could.” Companies that fix disparities in their service delivery are likely to boost customer View Details
Keywords: by Pamela Reynolds
- May 2016
- Case
OPET: Precision Marketing in Uncertain Times
By: Rajiv Lal, Esel Çekin and Eren Kuzucu
During Timucin Guler’s decade at OPET, a prominent fuel distributor in Turkey, he transformed the definition of marketing in the company. Under Guler’s lead, OPET, once a local player in the downstream distribution market, became the second largest fuel distributor in... View Details
Keywords: Customer Satisfaction; Customer Service; Emerging Market; Focusing On Customers; Competition; Turkey; Loyalty Program; Marketing Strategy; Downstream Distribution; Customer Relationship Management; Energy Industry; Turkey
Lal, Rajiv, Esel Çekin, and Eren Kuzucu. "OPET: Precision Marketing in Uncertain Times." Harvard Business School Case 516-087, May 2016.
- Forthcoming
- Article
Mitigating the Negative Effects of Customer Anxiety Through Access to Human Contact
By: Michelle A. Kinch and Ryan W. Buell
Prior research in social psychology has shown that when people feel anxious, they seek advice from others. However, companies that operate in high-anxiety settings (like financial services, health care, and education) are increasingly deploying self-service... View Details
- March 2011
- Exercise
Customer Intelligence Advantage: Module 2 Assignment
By: F. Asis Martinez Jerez
This exercise directs students to analyze a customer-centric firm by first understanding the elements that characterize a customer-centric organization, then by capturing and comparing this firm's approach to customer-centricity. Students interview three levels in the... View Details
Keywords: Business Units; Customer Focus and Relationships; Customer Satisfaction; Employees; Knowledge Sharing; Knowledge Use and Leverage; Leadership; Competitive Advantage
Martinez Jerez, F. Asis. "Customer Intelligence Advantage: Module 2 Assignment." Harvard Business School Exercise 111-118, March 2011.
- 21 Jul 2003
- Research & Ideas
Don’t Get Buried in Customer Data—Use It
Cisco relies on three layers of customer data to inform its efforts to improve customer satisfaction: The overall satisfaction survey that View Details
Keywords: by Jean Ayers
- 26 Mar 2019
- Working Paper Summaries
Mitigating the Negative Effects of Customer Anxiety Through Access to Human Contact
- 20 Aug 2020
- Working Paper Summaries
Can Shared Service Delivery Increase Customer Engagement? A Study of Shared Medical Appointments
- October 1994 (Revised March 1999)
- Case
Ritz-Carlton: Using Information Systems to Better Serve the Customer
By: W. Earl Sasser, Thomas O. Jones and Norman Klein
Explores the interface of an information system that keeps track of guests and their preferences, and the people systems that deliver multiple services at Ritz-Carlton hotels. The luxury hotel chain's unique service credo and commitment to quality principles are... View Details
Keywords: Competency and Skills; Customer Satisfaction; Training; Recruitment; Service Delivery; Supply Chain Management; Luxury; Balance and Stability; Information Technology
Sasser, W. Earl, Thomas O. Jones, and Norman Klein. "Ritz-Carlton: Using Information Systems to Better Serve the Customer." Harvard Business School Case 395-064, October 1994. (Revised March 1999.)
- 10 Oct 2018
- Research & Ideas
The Legacy of Boaty McBoatface: Beware of Customers Who Vote
public. Boaty blowback highlights the potential danger of giving consumers the power to vote, even though customer engagement is a primary goal of almost every social media strategy. The problem: Even though NERC never explicitly promised... View Details
- Research Summary
Overview
By: Rob Markey
Most companies' leaders declare their commitment to delivering value to customers. Many have adopted language such as "customer-centric" or "customer-obsessed." Companies that consistently earn top marks for customer loyalty in their industry deliver total shareholder... View Details
- October 2016
- Case
Turkasset: Bringing Customer-Centricity to Debt Collection
By: Dennis Campbell and Gamze Yucaoglu
In December 2014, in preparation for the year-end board presentation, Hilmi Guvenal (PMD 1993), shareholder and CEO of Turkasset, and Ilker Yoney, COO, sat down to discuss Turkasset’s five- and ten-year strategic plans. Since taking leadership of the company in 2009,... View Details
Keywords: Customer Satisfaction; Customer Experience; Customer Service; Customer-centric; Emerging Market; Customer Focus; Employee Empowerment; Employee Engagement; Employee Training; Staffing; Operations Management; Quality Management; Service Management; Service Quality; Continuous Improvement; Turkasset; Collections Agency; NPL; Call Center; Financial Services; Borrowing and Debt; Customer Focus and Relationships; Organizational Culture; Operations; Management; Service Operations; Quality; Competitive Advantage; Cost vs Benefits; Financial Services Industry; Turkey
- 12 Feb 2018
- Research & Ideas
Customers at the Back of the Line Are Anxious—Can You Keep Them from Leaving?
customers, and how operational choices affect customer behaviors and firm performance. We all spend a surprising amount of time waiting our turn; by one estimate, Americans wait in line 37 billion hours a year—118 hours for every person.... View Details