Possible Questions for Field Projects

• 1a: What are the central business processes? What do customers provide, and how does the service provider add value to the customer inputs?
• 1b: Who are the various customer groups and what motivates each to select the service provider?

• 2a: When does production take place and how is production timing controlled?
• 2b: What defines capacity and how are capacity decisions made? Are the capacity decisions effective?
• 2c: Why is the service facility located where it is located, and is that an appropriate location?
• 2d: To what degree are key service processes automated versus performed by labor, and is that optimal from various perspectives?
• 2e: What is the “product” of the service production and what happens to that “product” after service delivery?

• 3a: Do customers regularly experience nontrivial waiting for service, why, is it a problem, and what might be done about it?
• 3b: In what way do tangible aspects of the service provide information to customers about intangible aspects of the service? How are the tangibles managed, and is it adequate?
• 3c: How does variability in production impact the ability to deliver high-quality service at an appropriate price? Is the service process sufficiently robust (i.e., able to handle production variability)?
• 3d: How is production measured over time, and are the measurements appropriate?
• 3e: How is quality managed, and what limits the quality?

• 4a: Is there a supply chain

(more to come… but not necessarily right away)