Lean Six Sigma in Telecommunication Services
As per the industry classification benchmark, this industry sector includes the following subsectors –
Mobile Telecommunications – Providers of mobile telephone services, including cellular, satellite and paging services. Includes wireless tower companies that own, operate and lease mobile site towers to multiple wireless service providers.
Companies in mobile telecom sector like Airtel, France Telecom and Vodafone have been reaping benefits from Six Sigma concepts for quite some time now. Airtel has been using Six Sigma DFSS and DMAIC roadmaps.
Some example projects in mobile telecom are –
- Reducing the Billing Errors, Timeliness of Billing.
- Improving the Call Completion Ratio, which is a result of Network Quality.
- Timeliness and Quality of New Schemes that are launched from time to time
- Improving ARPU (Average revenue per unit)
- Reducing Customer Churn
- Improving Sales Productivity
- Case Study Description
- In a large telecom company, it was found that the order error rate for order provisioning campaigns is as high as 14 %. Various reasons were identified including – incorrect code assignment, duplicate orders, incompatible orders accepted, order entry errors, code errors etc. A Six Sigma DMAIC project was taken up that successfully brought down the order error rate to 1%. The success of this project led to more than 4 million saving in addition to reduction in customer complaints and dissatisfaction.
- Value added Services (VAS) reversal in prepaid connections has been the biggest issue for Customer Service of a large mobile services provider. On detailed analysis, it was found that customer service agents were erroneously de-activating value adding services while providing customer service. FMEA was used to find out the possible causes of such failure modes in the entire range of customer service activities. A control plan was created to ensure that inadvertent errors came down. Additional controls were implemented for correction as such manual errors could not be totally eliminated – the change in VAS service was made impossible without customer’s recorded concurrence. As 100% recording was initiated, each case became verifiable and led to increased consciousness among agents. Reduction in VAS reversal complaints led to higher customer satisfaction as well as increased revenues.
Feedback from participants
The trainer is extremely witty and comes out with amazing examples for better understanding. He has excellent knowledge of Six Sigma. The examples used to explain various statistical concepts were wonderful.
-Sreejit Nair, Manager, Hutchison Whampoa (3G)
Inferences drawn from real-life scenarios… examples on application of these concepts in our day to day life…helped me reflect back on my existing work scenarios & how I could improve them.
– Sonali K Anubhavne, Team Leader, Hutchison 3G
I liked the pre course material and Mr. Khatri’s sense of humor. He gave lots of practical examples while discussing the theoretical concepts.
-.Mithun Bhujang Shetty, Quality Leader, 3 Global Services Pvt. Ltd.
It is a great learning about six sigma and very helpful in professional growth
-Poonam Tripathi, Sr. Exevutive, Dishnet Wireless (Aircel) Kolkata
The general overview and focus on Analyze and Control Phase were equally helpful.
–Kunal Bhandari, Business Analyst, Orange Business Services.
The automated tools provided to carry out six sigma project were the best part of the training session.
-Rachna Misra: Senior Service Assurance Executive, Aircel Dishnet
Feedback from participants
The trainer is extremely witty and comes out with amazing examples for better understanding. He has excellent knowledge of Six Sigma. The examples used to explain various statistical concepts were wonderful.
-Sreejit Nair, Manager, Hutchison Whampoa (3G)
Inferences drawn from real-life scenarios… examples on application of these concepts in our day to day life…helped me reflect back on my existing work scenarios & how I could improve them.
– Sonali K Anubhavne, Team Leader, Hutchison 3G
I liked the pre course material and Mr. Khatri’s sense of humor. He gave lots of practical examples while discussing the theoretical concepts.
-.Mithun Bhujang Shetty, Quality Leader, 3 Global Services Pvt. Ltd.
It is a great learning about six sigma and very helpful in professional growth
-Poonam Tripathi, Sr. Exevutive, Dishnet Wireless (Aircel) Kolkata
The general overview and focus on Analyze and Control Phase were equally helpful.
–Kunal Bhandari, Business Analyst, Orange Business Services.
The automated tools provided to carry out six sigma project were the best part of the training session.
-Rachna Misra: Senior Service Assurance Executive, Aircel Dishnet