quality:
Working on
quality:
WORKING ON
5 International
Complaints
centralized
Inhouse training
dient focus
ISSUE 34/17 OCTOBER 1994
and the agents of change will
be trained in how to handle the
results and how to take action
on them. The first stage is
always diagnosis,' Keizer
continues, 'then you look at
what you can improve and
how, so you take action at
department level. Staff will be
informed of the results very
soon - it may even have
happened before this appears.'
The current system of
registering complaints is under
examination and a new
cliënt.' The concept behind the
new structure which has emerg-
ed from the 'Looking at cost'
project means CBS has a real
jumping off point for the quali
ty drive. 'The task force came up
with 31 projects that it believes
will promote and stimulate
quality service by giving people
real objectives to focus on,' Plas
man explains. 'Right now, the
name of the game is to do the
common uncommonly well, and
we hope the 31 projects will
achieve that by making sure we
can compete on every level. They
will put in place systems and help
change the mentality of our
people throughout the organiz-
ation so that we are all continu-
ally concerned with quality and
involve quality in everything we
do.'
The 31 projects are each headed
by a Rabobanker with real
expertise in the specific area they
are designed to improve. These
people are known as agents of
change because they are respon-
sible for developing the projects.
When it is completed, they pass
it on to the quality managers -
Henk Gentis and Wouter Kolff -
who monitor progress on behalf
of the management committee.
Implementation is down to the
agents of change who will also re
port back to staff on progress.
'We've started a newsletter to
keep our Holland-based people
abreast of what is going on,' says
Kolff. 'Information has to flow,
we have to get rid of the director-
ate mentality here in Utrecht
where we see too many vertical
lines and replace that thinking
with more horizontal lines. We
want to come across to clients as
a bank that has partnership in its
soul, but that also applies for our
own staff, too. We're all each
other's partners. So, everyone
has to know what is going on and
this is why we're developing tools
to keep people informed at all
times.'
Even before the kick-off, the
other projects had already been
defined and some had been
launched. 'But there is more
now,' Kolff continues. 'We were
able to present some of the re
sults of the employee satisfaction
survey at the meeting, but all the
data weren't complete then. We
now have the full results. These
have been analyzed and broken
down. They have certainly given
us real food for thought. While
the 31 projects are concrete mat-
ters that can be tackled through
work-groups, the critical obser-
vations that have come out of the
survey need serious consider-
ation and action. We have learnt
a lot from those results and are
already working on getting a
better rating next time.'
According to Kolff, the manage
ment committee will be re-
sponding in the very near future.
'That is where we stand at the
moment,' he says, 'and we will
continue to report on the
progress of the 31 projects and
on what we hope will be the right
way of tackling the observations
made by staff in the survey. It is
imperative we maintain the mo-
mentum. That is what people
expect, and rightly so. Hopeful-
ly, we will come up with the right
answers to improve staff satis
faction and get the whole CBS
operation more focused on the
needs of our customers.'
structure will be introduced in
the near future. 'At present,'
says Prevoo, 'we only register
operations-related complaints.
That will change because we are
setting up a system which will
cover the whole of the CBS -
every department. All
complaints will come into a
central register so that we can
see where things are going
wrong, or where there is a
bottleneck, so we can put it
right.'
'This is essentially a very
simple project',' says Keizer,
'but it is small details that
make all the difference. It is
designed to change our
mindset and behaviour
towards clients in our day-to-
day contact with them.' The
inhouse training course is very
practical and will look at
methods of improving the way
clients are handled, for
example, on the telephone.