Using LEAN Continuous Improvement to
Strengthen Contact Centre Performance
Part 3 of 4
“Identifying Waste In Your Contact Centre”
An important part of Customer Value is determining whether tasks to deliver products or services are “Value
Added” (VA) or non-value added (NVA). A simple definition of VA is “anything that consumes resources that the
customer would be willing to pay for”. Waste is an NVA task that consumes resources but does NOT create
customer value. Resources can mean people’s time, materials, equipment, space or money.
The 7 original wastes are defined by “T-I-M-W-O-O-D” - Transportation, Inventory, Motion, Waiting, Overproduction, Over-processing, and Defects. Recently, LEAN practitioners have added “Staff” (underutilization of)
and “Safety” to the original seven wastes, for a total of nine wastes.
While these original seven wastes were initially defined in a manufacturing environment, the concepts apply to
a contact centre as well. The following table illustrates each type of waste in a contact centre:
WASTE
Transportation
Inventory
Motion
Waiting
Overproduction
Over-processing
Defects
Staff
Safety
Manufacturing
Movement of Materials,
Product
Accumulation of Materials,
WIP, Product
Movement of people or body
parts
Waiting to do work
Typically refers to …
Contact Center
Movement of Work (ie a call), or
information
Inventory of Information, Accumulation
of Work (in progress), or lack of product
inventory (short stock)
Movement of people or body parts
Contact Center Example
Call Transfer, Escalation
Easy to find info, # Calls in queue,
ACW (after call work), Call backs
Looking for information, copying or
faxing, escalating to manager
Waiting to do work
Not ready status, waiting for work,
call transfers, waiting for up stream
response
More inventory than required
More agents than required
Lower productivity ratios
Changes to product "form fit
Time spent on call that does not create Long scripts, answering questions not
feel" but does not create value
customer value
asked, jumping to conclusions,
pushing work back onto customers
Errors, repairs, inspection of
Actions not aligned with customers
Inaccurate information, incorrect
product or subassembly
expectations
transfer or routing
Not making use of the skills of Not making use of the skills of employees
Employees could improve scripts,
employees
process, or suggest ideas
Process of workplace risks to
Workplace processes pose risks to
Unrealistic expectations of
employees health and well
employees health and well being
productivity or skills (without required
being
training) causing stress
9 Wastes – “T I M W O O D” + “SS”
A more detailed description of each type of waste is as follows:
1. Transportation – any unnecessary movement of materials or work. A key offender of transportation waste in
contact centres is “call1 transfers”, and “escalations” as these tasks directly inconvenience the customer.
Another example might be mailing the customer product literature, when the option of a web page link
exists. Caution – it is important to note that the preferred method of providing information to the customer
should be based on what the customer needs (values), not what is convenient for the organization.
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“Call” refers to all forms of contact including telephone calls, emails, fax, chats and social media.
©2013 MasterKey Business Solutions Inc.
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Using LEAN Continuous Improvement to
Strengthen Contact Centre Performance
2. Inventory – while inventory originally referred to products or materials in a manufacturing process, inventory
in a contact centre is typically defined as an accumulation of work (in progress) as illustrated by increasing
queue sizes. This can be measured through metrics like “average # of calls in queue”, and “after call work”.
Also, in a contact centre where physical products are ordered, inventory waste can be due to “lack of
available products (i.e. inventory)” to provide or ship to customers.
3. Motion – any unnecessary movement of people. This can range from an agent trying to find something in/on
their desk or computer, to having to go to the printer, or photocopier, or manager (in the case of an
escalation). Motion can also apply to making the customer “move” – for example, asking them to call
another phone number, or asking them to fax something to you (especially when your company already has
the information), or asking them to go to a (different) location for face-face service.
4. Waiting – often applies to a customer stuck in an IVR2 system, or an agent either in a non-productive status,
waiting for the next call, or waiting for an up-stream request for information or authorization. Waiting can
also apply directly to the customer (e.g. call transfers and escalations create wait times for the customer).
5. Overproduction – while overproduction is a result of producing more product than is required by the
customer (demand), overproduction has a different meaning in a contact centre because of its real time,
transactional service characteristics. Overproduction translates to staffing more agents than is required for
the demand at any given time. Having more capacity than is required is considered as wasteful, and leads
to other forms of waste like waiting. It is important to note that overproduction (or overcapacity in the case
of a contact centre) often hides waste and inefficiency as this extra capacity allows agents to work in a nonoptimal manner undetected.
6. Over-processing – Over-processing in a manufacturing environment typically refers to additional touch time
as a result of an ineffective or error-prone process. In a contact centre environment, over-processing
means spending more time and resources on a call than the customer deems necessary (i.e. it does not
create value for the customer).
7. Defects – Errors in the product, service or contact centre operations or processes. An error can be defined
as “a product, service, or process that is not working as per expectations set with the customer”.
8. Staff – by not making use of employee’s knowledge, wisdom, and creativity (especially on the “front line”)
the customer’s time is wasted due to lost opportunities to reduce errors and speed up the process. A key
principle of LEAN is employee empowerment (with trust and respect); this leads to greater employee
engagement.
9. Safety – working in an unsafe work environment causes unexpected time off due to injury and/or health
issues (creating inefficiencies which are wasteful). A common health risk in contact centres is “overburden”
which causes stress, time off, and unbalanced teams.
Stay tuned for this upcoming blog!
 Part 4 of 4 - “A 5 Step Process to Strengthen Contact Centre Performance”
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Interactive Voice Response system.
©2013 MasterKey Business Solutions Inc.
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