Comfort Class Transport Does Customer Service need an Overhaul Case Solution

2. What is/are the performance gaps? Identify performance gaps at all three levels (individual, team, and organization)    

In terms of an organization, performance gaps mean that the employee is not able to meet the performance standards set by the organization. The performance gap has trifold implications. The first is at the individual level. If an employee is not performing well, his self-esteem may get damaged, he might be not able to meet his career goals, he might not be able to grab promotion and benefits, and eventually, he might be laid off at that level. 

Second effect is at the group level. In all organizations, employees must engage in group tasks. These group tasks require the employees to work collaboratively with their peers and be able to solve the problems at the group level. If an employee is facing performance gaps, he might not be able to give his best when working in a team. He might not be able to contribute meaningfully to the team and might lack the interpersonal or collaborative skills to work with the teams. Similarly, due to performance gaps, his self-esteem would be low, and he would not be able to participate in the group assignments confidently because of questioning his abilities. 

Third effect of the performance gap is on the individual level. It is a universal fact that the success of an organization depends on the performance of the employees. In this case, CCT has only seven CSRs to serve customers. This can create a lagging effect and could affect further the expansion plans by impacting the customer base given that 30% of customers who experience missed calls do not contact CCT but rather competitors (Roberts & Morrison, 2011). Lastly, at the organizational level, CCT needs to improve its customer call responding service.

3. What data would you collect to identify the actual cause of the gap?    

The data needed to find identify the performance gaps is the relative performance of the employees up to the organization’s metrics. The gaps can be identified by several methods. One method could be assessing the performance relative to the rubric. A rubric is given before the tasks which outline the expectations of the organization from the employee relative to the task assigned. By comparing the rubric standards with the actual performance, a gap can be identified (Hummel, 2003). 

Second method could be counting the number of defects. This holds mostly in the operations department. If the number of defects is lower, the performance is good and if the number of defects is higher, the performance is poor. Third method to assess the performance gap is peer evaluation (Duan, 2011). This method holds for the group assignment. In the peer evaluation, employees rank their peers according to their performance levels in the group assignment. This assignment can be in the form of collaboration, motivation, inputting ideas. Another popular method is the customer data or customer satisfaction level. This holds mostly for the sales department. The data is used to assess the performance of the sales representatives relative to the customer’s expectations.

4. Who would you collect the data from and why?