Browsing by Author "Marr, Bernard"

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    Business performance management: current state of the art. A survey report
    (Cranfield School of Management and Hyperion, 2004) Marr, Bernard
    Business Performance Management (BPM) is a term frequently used among senior executives of leading corporations around the globe to describe the management processes and business systems they use to improve performance and accountability. However, very few reliable studies have documented the state of the art, common practices and tangible benefits of BPM. To close this gap we conducted one of the largest surveys into BPM, the results of which are summarised in this report. In late 2003, we collected data from 780 Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) and Chief Financial Officers (CFOs) from the 5,000 largest organisations in the United States.
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    Managing and measuring for value: the case of call centre performance
    (Cranfield School of Management and Fujitsu, 2004) Marr, Bernard; Neely, Andrew
    As an integral part of most organisations today call centres play a key role in the service delivery chain. Value creation is in the eye of the beholder, if organisations fail to deliver value to their customers, there will inevitably be a loss for stakeholders over the longer term. Presently in many industries, call centres are the primary source of contact for customers. This important role implies that the performance management of call centres is of critical importance to organisations, especially the delivery of customer satisfaction. In this research the ways organisations measure and manage customer satisfaction in call centres is explored. Clear evidence that current measures of performance in call centres are often counter-productive to achieving customer satisfaction is revealed. Many call centres seem to have fallen into the trap of believing that operational measures such as call duration are indicators of customer satisfaction. Evidence indicates that they are not; they are only measures of efficiency, which in turn is seen as determinant of financial performance. Most call centres seem to miss the important link between employee satisfaction, service quality, customer satisfaction, and profitability. In 12 case studies of world-leading call centres, the research identifies various managerial implications to avoid the "efficiency trap" in measuring and managing call centre performance. The managerial implications of this research are as follows: l Call centre performance is increasingly important for delivering customer service. Call centre performance should not be measured in isolation from the performance of the whole organisation. In most cases they are not detached operations with a solitary goal of driving down costs. Call centres are an integral part of an organisations value chain delivering its services and products. Therefore, the performance measures of call centres need to reflect the strategic direction of the entire organisation. l A more balanced approach to measuring performance based on strategic objectives is valuable, especially if visual representations of service delivery and value creation are used. This enables easy communication of overall performance and puts efficiency targets in perspective. Best practice seems to be to track the following areas of performance as well as their interactions: employee satisfaction, service quality, customer satisfaction, and satisfaction of other stakeholders (e.g. financial performance) with particular emphasis on the intangible performance drivers. l Customer dialogue is important and call centres are in fact listening to and speaking with customers all the time. Measuring customer satisfaction should start with understanding customers. Communication is often very task orientated, whereas call centres need to recognise the importance of listening to the customers in order to: - understand their needs and requirements from their perspective - detect failures, bottle necks, or improvement potential - deliver service that satisfies the customer. l It is critical to understand and classify the nature of demand. Often calls are unwanted or even unwittingly generated by other parts of the organisation. By analysing and classifying demand, it becomes more manageable and more predictable. Unwanted calls could then be reduced or even eliminated. Overall, a strategy-driven and integrated approach towards performance measurement in call centres will, therefore, improve operational efficiency and contribute to continuous innovation of the organisation as a whole.
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    Measuring corporate management and leadership capability
    (Cranfield School of Management, 2002) Neely, Andrew; Gray, Dina; Kennerley, Mike; Marr, Bernard
    The Council for Excellence in Management and Leadership commissioned the Centre for Business Performance at Cranfield School of Management to produce for them a report investigating the case for corporate reporting and disclosure in the field of organisational management and leadership. Clearly there are pros and cons for such reporting, especially if it is made compulsory through the forthcoming Company Law review, but on balance the authors are of the opinion that: 1. Greater corporate reporting and disclosure in the field of organisational management and leadership is not only desirable, but also inevitable. 2. Legislation may result in organisations reporting more in the field of organisational management and leadership sooner than they would otherwise, but in the longer term market forces will force them to report this information. 3. The steps that organisations are taking to adopt measurement frameworks that balance financial and non-financial issues mean that they are already building the infrastructure necessary to enable this reporting. 4. It is impractical to expect that a generic set of reporting standards applicable to all organisations can be developed for this area. It is widely believed that performance measures are context and strategy specific. Hence requiring organisations to report against a standard set of measures will simply result in additional bureaucratic burdens being placed on them. 5. An alternative, and much more pragmatic approach, however, is to accept that the role of measurement is to provide insight. What investors, and other external stakeholders, want is insight into the management and leadership talent pool that exists within organisations. As a result it should be possible to encourage and/or require organisations to release information in their annual reports which provides fact based insights into their management and leadership talent pool. 6. To provide a structure for such disclosure the authors recommend that a portfolio of critical questions about the management and leadership talent pool be developed and that organisations be encouraged and/or required to provide answers to these questions through fact based evidence of their own choosing. 7. Many organisations would benefit from the rigour provided by this approach. Far too often the performance measures that organisations have in place in the arena of organisational management and leadership are poorly developed and deployed.
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    Towards a definition of a business performance measurement system
    (Emerald Group Publishing Limited, 2007-08-01T00:00:00Z) Franco-Santos, Monica; Kennerley, Mike; Micheli, Pietro; Martinez, Veronica; Mason, Steve; Marr, Bernard; Gray, Dina; Neely, Andrew
    Scholars in the field of performance measurement tend to use the term business performance measurement (BPM) systems without explaining exactly what they mean by it. This lack of clarity creates confusion and comparability issues, and makes it difficult for researchers to build on one an each other's work. The purpose of this paper is to identify the key characteristics of a BPM system, by reviewing the different definitions of a BPM system that exist in the literature. This work aims to open a debate on what are the necessary and sufficient conditions of a BPM system. It is also hoped that a greater level of clarity in the performance measurement research arena will be encouraged. Design/methodology/approach--The performance measurement literature is reviewed using a systematic approach. Findings--Based on this research, a set of conditions of a BPM system has been proposed from which researchers can choose those which are necessary and sufficient conditions for their studies. Research limitations/implications--The analysis in this paper provides a structure and set of characteristics that researchers could use as a reference framework to define a BPM system for their work, and as a way to define the specific focus of their investigations. More clarity and precision around the use of the BPM systems phrase will improve the generalisability and comparability of research in this area. Originality/value--By reviewing the different definitions of a BPM system that exist in the literature this paper will hopefully stimulate a debate on the necessary and sufficient conditions of a BPM system and encourage a greater level of clarity in the performance measurement research arena.