Question

Continental Airlines: This Call Is Being Monitored

If you’ve ever placed a call to any big company’s customer service department, you’ve heard the caveat: “This call may be monitored for quality assurance purposes.” But is anyone really listening? Someone is—or at least the computers are—at Continental Airlines.

Building customer loyalty has become crucial in the be- leaguered airline industry, which is why Continental enlisted the help of Witness Systems, whose call-center software, CallMiner, does more than eavesdrop: It records conversations and captures every keystroke, so managers know whether the right actions were taken. And because the ex- changes reveal what customers really want, Continental is also mining the data to help craft marketing plans and shape overall strategy. Fortunately for Witness, which saw its revenues jump 60 percent to $108 million in 2003, that trend is catching on: 53 percent of its clients are now using such data beyond the call center.

Continental Airlines is the world’s seventh-largest airline and has more than 2,300 daily departures. With 134 domes- tic and 92 international destinations, Continental has the broadest global route network of any U.S. airline, including extensive service throughout the Americas, Europe, and Asia. Continental has hubs serving New York, Houston, Cleveland, and Guam and carries approximately 41 million passengers per year on the newest jet fleet among major U.S. airlines. With 42,000 employees, Continental is ranked one of the 100 Best Companies to Work For in America by For- tune Magazine. In 2003, Fortune ranked Continental highest among major U.S. carriers in the quality of its service and products, and No. 2 on its list of Most Admired Global Airlines.

Despite these accolades, before the CallMiner software was installed in 2001, Continental’s agents were unable to re- solve about 6 percent of the 60 million calls they fielded annually. Instead, these problems were routed to an internal help desk. The Witness data revealed that some agents “weren’t attempting to look up the answers on their own,” says Andre Harris, director of reservations training and qual- ity. New standards were put in place, and within a year, nearly 20 percent fewer calls were being sent to the help desk, saving the company $1 million. In addition, customer satisfaction rose by 10 percent, and e-ticket sales increased by 8 percent.

  

Harris soon realized that the data could be a treasure trove for marketing and service operations too. “We thought we were just replacing tape recorders,” she says, “but it dawned on us that we could use this system to drive business decisions.” Now if enough calls come in on one topic, Continental can respond. For instance, when the company learned that as many as 14 percent of customers were recon- firming flights, it ran a notice in its in-flight magazine to assure fliers that such calls were unnecessary.

To make the call monitoring more effective, Continental added CallMiner, a labor-saving Witness program that automatically transcribes conversations into text. “It gives me more time to analyze the data,” Harris says, “rather than just collect it.”

Tying speech systems to mainstream corporate IT systems, and the use of Internet-based voice systems such as Voice over IP (VoIP)1, are making it easier to mine databases of voice records, much as companies have mined other customer records for years. Intelligent Voice Recognition (IVR) analysis tools usually can keep track of and report on a caller’s choices based on which menu paths the caller has taken. But CallMiner and a few other tools can go into the voice record and look for specific words or word combinations. Continental recorded a sample of its 5 million monthly calls and then used CallMiner to turn the dialogues into text to mine for certain things. It discovered that about 10 percent of the calls contain the actual word reconfirm.

Calls to reconfirm a flight are, “quite frankly, low-value calls,” says Harris. She says she used the CallMiner analysis to justify the deployment of a new IVR system just for flight confirmations.

Continental currently has eight people listening to samples of calls in order to manually prepare a “call-mix report,” which is used for analytical purposes by marketers and business planners at the airline. “The pilot test [of CallMiner] helped me realize very quickly that I can do this with one person instead of eight,” she says. And do it better.

Harris’s efforts paid off and won her the Innovator of the Year award from Witness Systems. This award recognizes contact center managers and their respective companies for outstanding customer service accomplishments.

Harris was chosen for her leadership in developing and implementing Continental’s “Call-Mix Survey” program for collecting and analyzing important data that can only be captured in the contact center and for using it to help support the strategic direction of the organization. While monitoring calls through CallMiner, team leaders complete online call-mix surveys to track the different types of calls coming into the reservation centers and review calls that were received by the help desk.

Within a few months, the survey results revealed a significant increase in customer reconfirmation calls—in some months the number almost doubled. Reconfirmation of flights is not a requirement for Continental’s passengers. Therefore, the quality assurance task force presented their findings and enlisted other areas of the company, including marketing, corporate communications, and reservation operations, to educate customers that reconfirmation is unnecessary. Within two months of identifying the problem and launching the program, the company reduced the number of calls almost 5 percent and has maintained a lower level of reconfirmation calls.

The survey data also revealed areas in which agents needed more training. For example, the surveys pinpointed the most frequently asked questions and helped Continental identify issues with the navigation of its reservation system. Using the CallMiner enabled the airline to make technological improvements so agents

can better navigate the system. “By reducing the number of reconfirmation calls and the number of calls agents made to our support desk, we realized more than $1 million in annualized savings,” states Harris.

“With 60 million calls coming into our reservations centers each year, it’s critical that we understand our interactions and how they’re being handled by our agents so we can look for the root cause of any challenges our agents have in servicing customers. We believe in promoting and fostering excellence to remain leaders in our industry.”

Since implementing these innovative processes and technology, Continental has become a leader in customer service and is recognized throughout the industry. Among its industry accolades, Continental has been named one of the top ten call centers in the industry by Call Center Magazine, listed as a top 100 training program for three consecutive years by Training Magazine, and ranked as one of the best companies to work for by Fortune Magazine for five years in a row.

“Continental is a perfect example of how companies can use workforce optimization software to capture customer intelligence and apply the information to improve performance in the contact center and throughout the overall business,” states Nancy Treaster, senior vice president, global marketing for Witness Systems. “With eQuality, Continental has generated significant return on investment through cost savings, improved customer satisfaction and loyalty. Their organization and employees like Andre are true innovators in the customer service industry.”

From the manually prepared call-mix report, Continental could see that it makes a sale on only half of all calls, but it couldn’t tell why sales were lost. Telephone agents try to elicit the reasons, and soon automated call mining will enable the airline to analyze callers’ responses, Harris says. It may also save passengers some money the next time they book a Continental flight.

CASE STUDY QUESTIONS

1. What are the business benefits of the CallMiner system? Provide some additional examples beyond those discussed in the case.

2. How can new technologies like CallMiner help companies improve their customer service and gain a competitive edge in the marketplace? Explain.

3. Andre Harris refers to calls to reconfirm a flight as “quite frankly, low-value calls.” Why are they classified as low value? Why do you think so many customers are placing such calls?

QUESTION TWO [15 Marks]

This is an apply level question that tests your understanding of the various information systems and their practical usage in the business environment.

PRACTICAL/APPLICATION-TYPE QUESTION

The coronavirus, COVID-19 started in late December 2019 in Wuhan, China. Within the space of two months it has engulfed the whole world infecting millions of people and killing hundreds of thousands. The world

economy has also been heavily affected. Stock markets, oil prices and actually everything is experiencing a decline. The only other thing that businesses can now depend upon to keep going without totally facing bankruptcy and total collapse is information systems. The deteriorated conditions of the business world is as a result of the restriction on the movement of people and forced lockdowns being experienced around the world where businesses cannot operate. Life around the world is not likely to return the “normal” that we use to know of, and the problem of social distancing and restricted movement will stay with us for some time. This is also going to affect businesses in the way they operate.

As a student of MIS who has recently studied several topics in the course that can aid businesses to become efficient and completive, identify any business (small or large) in Ghana and describe in practical terms how that business can employ information systems to enhance business continuity in these current socio- economic conditions of COVID-19.

Your description should be very specific in how information systems can be utilised by the business identified. It should include the type of information system(s) to be employed, the area of the business it will affect (eg. Manufacturing, marketing, accounting, etc), the internal users of the information systems (eg. top level management, middle-level, etc), and how the information systems will be used (provide goods/services, production, supply-chain, call center, etc.)

Suggested answer guide (this is only a guide and you may or not use this guide)

 A general introduction to the situation

 Identify the industry in which the company operates

 Indicate and explain the specific role that the information systems are going to play in the business

 Indicate the specific type of information system(s) that will be used in the business (this may include the hardware type such as mobile technologies, etc, and software including social media, etc.)

 Identify and explain the specific strategic use of the information system in the business

 Identify possible challenges that are likely to be faced in using information systems in Ghana.

QUESTION THREE [15 Marks]

This is a recall level type question that require you identify the various business tools available for decision- making.

ESSAY-TYPE QUESTION

How do business intelligence and business analytics support decision-making?

Answer 1

UTILISATION OF MODERN TECHNOLOGY IN BUISNESS

1) In todays society there is many oppurtunities of technology for development.thus it should to utilised in modern business for increasing customer satisfaction.and callminer system is very usefull for the same.the technology used in callminer system helps in understanding customer needs. so it can be useful to satisfy the customer better business.Inorder to acheive business target callminer system will be effective.there are so many business benefits foir callminer system some of them arelisted below.

By the better use of callminer technology customer satisfaction can be improved.

Marketing plan can be accordingly altered.

The better customer service and satisfaction helps to acheive marketing target.

mny companies use varities of technologies for handling customer service in an cost effective and efficeint way

EXAMPLES

Company : Chiltpole -mexican grill

It is a american based restaurent with about 2500 and more branches earlier they were following olden methods of serving food such as self service . But later they increased the number of staffs for improving the speed and report delivery, to acess more data etc .. It had improve their knowledge on customer satisfactuion and their likes. it thus help them to provide better service . the utised the buisness anlytical graphs to study on the buisness around monthly and improved their buisness accordingly.

Company name : COCA-COLA

The company named coca cola enhance their intelligence team for all kind of delivery operations and sales of the comp[any. when they faced challenges in buisness they have started automatic manual reporting processes which helps to save 260 hours ina a year . The report automation helps the co mpany to improve their CRM . it also helped the comapny to improve the public image and their product acceptance.

Company name : RELIANCE

This buisness has a centralised intelligence solution team working 10-20 hours daily. Based on data collected they prepares an annagregate analysis about the overall growth of buisness . they are able to seee an track real time data which means the team can react with cunsumer behavior and optimize marketing campaigns.

CUSTOMER SERVICE TECHNOLOGY

1. SOFTWARE

the customer relationship can be improved and managed in a better way by gathering data tools . (software) .

2. ELECTRONIC MAIL

Mail is an easier and cost effective mode of communication that can be used for a buisness to interact with their lotyal customers . Through email organisations can respond quickly to the various needs and wants of customers .

3. WEBSITES

The customers can make use of organisation websites for making queries in relation to the product and service offered by the company.

Ability of callminer to evaluate and analyse survey responses ,chat emails,and other communication details with higher visibility of intelligence helps in agile redaction,communication comprehensive and search intelligenec too. callminer enhances the function of any organisation to take actions in accordance with the informations for improving sales customer experince marketing business and so on.business enviorment mainly has five dimensions such as economic enviorment, social enviorment,legal enviorment, political enviornment and so on. all these enviorment will be effected by our changing socio econnomic conditions.

  

In current situation of deppresion in indian economy all the business is affected by aftereffects of global disease ie corona virus.so market analysis becomes relevant to improve business.the business must be capable of performing in accordance with the cahanging economic condition for better profit.now it is a era of techology which efficiently uses data in every fdield to improve business in every aspect.business analytics is an rising field in data storage an analisation which aims to develope business. We are currently facing issues in COVID -19 such as buisness depression in fuel companies , electronics and mostly in every every fields . inorder to have a glowing future we now have to analyse the situation and to study the oppurtunities at this time . it is fuond that mobile companies have improved their buisness in lockdown time. so better data analysis in every field just helps to improve the buisness surruondings at current situation. . for example,for banks can analyse credit account customers transactions to study about the financial stability and make use of this knowledge for other purposes. business analytics (BA)refers to evrey technics utilised by any organisation to measure it performance. statistical methods are also adoptd for this.business intelligence analyses the current issues and the methods aadopted for solving it in the past. so many benefits involves in business analytics -

Helps to solve business issues and to face challenges

Better decision making in accordance with the situation

The correct tranferring of information

Reduction in cost

decisions can be improved

Along with many advantages there are some challenges in this technique such as in appropriate statergy for implementing in business, data integrity complication in maintenance etc. improved business performance and identification of oppurtunities can be done through BA proces. there are many organisations take decisions and important statergies that should be adopted in business are selected throgh this process. mainly solving problems . It explores providing useful methods for solving problems and oppurtunities. Buisness analytics find trend path for giving a clear definition inorder to find organisation oppurtunity.Thus decision making is a primary step in BA process. Thus it can be said that it helps in processes and support for decision making capacities and skills.The practice followed by an organisation by definig reccomending solutions and needs that deliver the value of stake holderts is known as buisness analysis. The goal of BA is to anable better and right change for buisness . The great buisness analysuis is all about facilitating buisness.

decision making is thus crucial for a buisness for its improved performance or in overcoming challenges. better decision comes from proper analysis of data and better data knowledge on the specific field. As the initial step we need to decide what oppurtunity we are giong to go after solving problem. some of the tips for better decision and sucess of buisness are listed

a) we need to keep errors in mind and learn from mistakes a buisness person need to learn systematically from the way of development and practice the same .it becomes easier to make buisness decuisions

b) Be open to change according to changing enviormental situatuions .never stuck with old cultures and values prevailed in society. try to adapt new socio economic conditions and make changes accordingly for growth of buisness.

c) BA helps to analyse market treends and thus we can add valuable insights to the problem . great buisnesses observe the market continuosly for understanding it and for planning how to react with them.

In all levels of management the same method should be followed for improving their function(top level, middle level, lower level) The analysis of market helps to segment the customers targeted by the product whose concern about high quality products .