Making room for the call center

Information Systems Management

Volumn 19, Issue 1, 2002, Pages 71-80

  Adria, Marco ^a   Chowdhury, Shamsud D ^b  

^a UNIVERSITY OF ALBERTA   (Canada)

^b ATHABASCA UNIVERSITY   (Canada)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 85001855941     PISSN: 10580530     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1201/1078/43199.19.1.20020101/31479.10     Document Type: Article

References (24)

1. This fictional scenario is intended to illustrate some of the key issues that face managers of IT-driven productivity initiatives such as call centers. It also represents actual experiences of the authors, who were involved in establishing and managing a call center that now provides learning support to some 7, 000 students annually at a Canadian university.
2. Smothers, N. P., 1990. Patterns of Japanese Strategy:Strategic Combinations of Strategies. Strategic Management Journal, 11:521–533.
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4. Handy, Charles. 1995. Trust and the virtual organization. Harvard Business Review, 73 (3):48 Service, IT, and virtual organizational designs are becoming increasingly interconnected as key components of a drive for productivity. The virtual or distributed workplace depends on the effective deployment of IT, and telework is a key component of the virtual organization. See See also Cascio, W.F., 2000, “Managing a virtual workplace,” Academy of Management Executive, 14 (3):81–90. Not all call centers use telework arrangements, but many do. A recent survey of companies with call centers found, for example, that 37.4% of company respondents used home agents at least some of the time. See Converging Communications Group, with MultiMedia Telecommunications Association (MMTA) and Advantage Business Research, 2000, “Call Center Industry Study,” CommWeb, September 6. Available:http://www.commweb.com/article/COM200009 06S0012, Telework has proven effective for improving productivity in many organizations. USWest attributed as much as 40% of its increase in employee productivity to telework. See Matthes, K., 1992, “Telecommuting:Balancing business and employee needs,” HR Focus, 69 (3), December 3
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13. Converging Communications Group, op. cit.
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18. 1998. A catalyst for change
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24. Handy, op. cit.