Publications

April 1993 (Revised May 2009)
Case

Aravind Eye Hospital, Madurai, India: In Service for Sight, The

By: V. Kasturi Rangan

Starting as a modest 20-bed hospital, Aravind had grown into a 1,400-bed hospital complex by 1992. It had by then screened 3.65 million patients and performed 335,000 cataract surgeries, nearly 70% of them free of cost for the poorest of India's blind population.... View Details

Keywords: Developing Countries and Economies; Social Marketing; Service Delivery; Service Operations; Welfare; Expansion; Health Industry; India

2017
Working Paper

Discretionary Task Ordering: Queue Management in Radiological Services

By: Maria Ibanez, Jonathan R. Clark, Robert S. Huckman and Bradley R. Staats

Work scheduling research typically prescribes task sequences implemented by managers. Yet employees often have discretion to deviate from their prescribed sequence. Using data from 2.4 million radiological diagnoses, we find that doctors prioritize similar tasks... View Details

SSRN

August 1982 (Revised May 1986)
Case

Lowe Computer Services: Capacity and Service Level Planning

By: James I. Cash Jr.

Keywords: Performance Capacity; Service Delivery; Planning

May 2024
Background Note

Pricing Strategy and Channels of Distribution: Where Value Delivery and Value Capture Intersect

By: Elie Ofek

Channels of distribution are a critical component of a firm’s go-to-market strategy. A company may elect to sell its products directly to customers (DTC) without the assistance of any intermediaries or, alternatively, it may seek several channel partners to help it... View Details

Keywords: Price; Distribution Channels; Business Strategy; Markets

May 28, 2018
Article

How Companies Can Identify Racial and Gender Bias in Their Customer Service

By: Alexandra C. Feldberg and Tami Kim

Research shows that minority customers — blacks and Asians — regularly receive worse customer service than whites in ways that are not immediately obvious to onlookers (or even managers). These results prompt a couple of questions for executives and managers. One, does... View Details

Keywords: Internal Audit; Customers; Service Delivery; Prejudice and Bias; Race; Gender; Organizational Change and Adaptation

Read Now

January 2015 (Revised March 2015)
Case

Oberoi Hotels: Train Whistle in the Tiger Reserve

By: Ryan W. Buell, Ananth Raman and Vidhya Muthuram

Celebrated as one of the world's premiere luxury hotel brands, Oberoi Hotels attracts and serves some of the most quality-sensitive guests in the world. The case considers the challenge of how an organization, with a standardized service model, can repeatedly delight... View Details

Keywords: Service Quality; Service Management; Service Quality Competition; Customer Management; Customer Service Excellence; Employee Empowerment; Employee Engagement; Employee Training; India; Hospitality; Hotel Industry; Service Delivery; Service Operations; Customer Satisfaction; Employees; Quality; Accommodations Industry; India

March 2016
Article

Using Quality Improvement Methods and Time-Driven Activity-Based Costing to Improve Value-Based Cancer Care Delivery at a Cancer Genetics Clinic

By: R.Y. Tan, M. Met-Domestici, K. Zhou, A.B. Guzman, S.T. Lim, K.C. Soo, T.W. Feeley and J. Ngeow

Purpose:
To meet increasing demand for cancer genetic testing and improve value-based cancer care delivery, National Cancer Centre Singapore restructured the Cancer Genetics Service in 2014. Care delivery processes were redesigned. We sought to improve access by... View Details

Keywords: Cancer Treatment; Value Based Health Care; Time-Driven Activity-Based Costing; Health Care and Treatment; Quality; Performance Improvement; Activity Based Costing and Management

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Article

Fighting Bias on the Front Lines

By: Alexandra C. Feldberg and Tami Kim

Most companies aim for exceptional customer service, but too few are attentive to the subtle discrimination by frontline employees that can alienate customers, lead to lawsuits, or even cause lasting brand damage by going viral.
This article presents research... View Details

Keywords: Customer Service; Customer Focus and Relationships; Service Delivery; Diversity; Prejudice and Bias; Organizational Change and Adaptation

Read Now

September 2018
Article

Discretionary Task Ordering: Queue Management in Radiological Services

By: Maria Ibanez, Jonathan R. Clark, Robert S. Huckman and Bradley R. Staats

Work-scheduling research typically prescribes task sequences implemented by managers. Yet employees often have discretion to deviate from their prescribed sequence. Using data from 2.4 million radiological diagnoses, we find that doctors prioritize similar tasks... View Details

Keywords: Discretion; Scheduling; Queue; Healthcare; Learning; Experience; Decentralization; Operations; Service Operations; Service Delivery; Performance; Performance Effectiveness; Performance Efficiency; Performance Improvement; Performance Productivity; Decisions; Time Management; Cost vs Benefits; Health Industry

SSRN

Teaching Interest

Overview

By: Rob Markey

Managing Service Operations - MBA Elective Curriculum

World-class service organizations deeply understand the needs and behaviors of their customers, and design, manage, and improve their operating models accordingly. This course... View Details

Keywords: Customer Lifetime Value; Customer Centric Initiative; Customer Engagement; Service Management; Service Profit Chain; Service Design; Service Models; Service Excellence; Customer Focus and Relationships; Customer Satisfaction; Customer Value and Value Chain; Service Delivery; Service Operations

March 2018 (Revised March 2019)
Technical Note

Control or Flexibility? Structured Empowerment Offers Both — Lessons from Retail & Service Chains

By: Tatiana Sandino

This note explains how several retail and service organizations use a practice described here as “structured empowerment” to balance control and flexibility as they grow. I define structured empowerment as a practice that grants employees both (a) the power to make... View Details

Keywords: Service Operations; Standards; Employees; Service Delivery; Decision Making; Power and Influence; Service Industry; Service Industry

September 2000
Background Note

Professional Services Module One: Introduction to the Challenges Facing PSFs

By: Thomas J. DeLong, Ashish Nanda and Scot H. Landry

This initial module was meant to clarify how the course would be useful to students who would be starting PSFs, working for them as an employee or contractor, managing them, or hiring them from the client side. View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Selection and Staffing; Management; Service Delivery; Service Industry

March 2019
Technical Note

Control or Flexibility? Structured Empowerment Offers Both—Lessons from Retail & Service Chains (Abridged)

By: Tatiana Sandino

This note explains how several retail and service organizations use a practice described here as “structured empowerment” to balance control and flexibility as they grow. I define structured empowerment as a practice that grants employees both (a) the power to make... View Details

Keywords: Service Operations; Standards; Employees; Service Delivery; Decision Making; Power and Influence; Service Industry; Service Industry

Forthcoming
Article

Achieving Epilepsy Care for All: Ecosystem-Based Transformation

By: Susanna Gallani, Bernice Martin Lee and Lidia M. V. R. Moura

Epilepsy exemplifies many of the systemic challenges of modern health care— fragmented care delivery, inequitable access, financial strain, and so on. The current “system of systems” (SoS) structure of U.S. health care fosters siloed operations among its member systems... View Details

Keywords: Healthcare Delivery; Epilepsy; Seizures; Health Care and Treatment; Health Disorders; Equality and Inequality; Framework; Service Delivery

February 2016 (Revised February 2020)
Teaching Note

Oberoi Hotels: Train Whistle in the Tiger Reserve

By: Ryan W. Buell and Ananth Raman

Celebrated as one of the world's premiere luxury hotel brands, Oberoi Hotels attracts and serves some of the most quality sensitive guests in the world. The case considers the challenge of how an organization with a standardized service model can repeatedly delight... View Details

Keywords: Service Quality; Service Management; Service Quality Competition; Customer Management; Customer Service Excellence; Employee Empowerment; Employee Engagement; Employee Training; Hospitality; Hotel Industry; Service Delivery; Service Operations; Customer Satisfaction; Employees; Training; Quality; Accommodations Industry; India

July – August 2011
Article

Deliberate Learning to Improve Performance in Dynamic Service Settings: Evidence from Hospital Intensive Care Units

By: I. M. Nembhard and A. L. Tucker

Dynamic service settings-characterized by workers who interact with customers to deliver services in a rapidly changing, uncertain, and complex environment (e.g., hospitals)-play an important role in the economy. Organizational learning studies in these settings have... View Details

Keywords: Experience and Expertise; Customer Focus and Relationships; Learning; Health Care and Treatment; Service Delivery; Performance Improvement; Quality; Groups and Teams; Cooperation; Health Industry

January 2023
Teaching Note

Identify the Health Care Venture

By: Regina E. Herzlinger and James Wallace

Teaching Note for HBS Exercise No. 323-061. View Details

Keywords: Health Care; Health Care Delivery; Health Care Financing; Health Care Industry; Health Care Services

Research Summary

Overview

My research seeks to understand and improve service integration across specialized professions and organizations. A critical idea driving my research is that work is becoming more dynamic, complex and interconnected, particularly for work that addresses difficult... View Details

Keywords: Organization Behavior; Health Care Delivery; Team Effectiveness; Organizational Learning

October 2012 (Revised September 2013)
Teaching Note

The Dabbawala System: On-Time Delivery, Every Time

By: Stefan H. Thomke

The Mumbai-based dabbawalas are a 5,000 or so person organization that achieves exceptional service performance with a semi-literate workforce. Every working day, they deliver and return about 130,000 lunchboxes to offices throughout Mumbai. This entails more than... View Details

Keywords: Systems Design; Organization Design; Service; Organizational Design; Service Operations; Service Delivery; Mumbai