Introduction
It is true that call centers are increasingly becoming important in the current market where brick-and-motar stores are losing their popularity to online stores. For Sekoorb Insurance, it is understandable how important it is to have an efficient workstation that has the capacity of meeting the market demands.
The decision to relocate the call centre from the town centre office to the newly rented out of town office accommodation is a brilliant idea that would not only increase the productivity of the workforce, but also make it easier for the relevant stakeholders to make a visit to the premises of this firm by avoiding the hustle and bustle of the city centre (Charantimanth 2003, p. 89).
However, this should be done efficiently and at a lower cost. The ultimate aim of this firm is to ensure that the relocation is done efficiently, and at a minimum cost possible. The negotiation done by Ron Black with a professional relocation company to cut down the cost from £325 per head relocated to £25,000 was very brilliant (Blell 2011, p. 112). However, I believe that we can cut down the cost further by about half this figure if we were to use internal labour to undertake this duty.
I believe that relocating the call centre can be done by using internal labour and internal equipments within this firm. I also believe that the current labour, including the technicians, have the capacity to undertake this activity within the weekends and deliver success as would be expected.
It is important to note that although the main reason why I propose the use of internal labour is because of the lower costs involved, it is also a fact that internal labour will deliver a better work because this is their facility, and they will feel responsible for every action they take in this process (Kanji 2005, p. 90). They will therefore, make an attempt to deliver quality result for the tasks assigned to them.
The Preparations
After comparing the costs associated with the relocation of the call center, I believe that the most efficient and cost effective way of conducting this relocation would be to use the internal labor. Given that the work will be undertaken over the weekend, it is very easy to mobilize this workforce to undertake the activities within these two days in order to ensure that the relocation is complete by Sunday evening ready for use the following day in the morning.
The preparations should start as early as possible in order to have everything planned for the weekend. Given the fact that the top management is fully aware and has approved this relocation, the main preparations will involve identifying the right workforce that will be involved in undertaking various activities, the equipment that would be needed, and a program on how each task should be undertaken within the firm.
In managing this project, the following are some of the preparations I will make in order to ensure that everything works as per the plan. Information is very important within an organization, irrespective of the position held within an organization (Chandra 2009, p. 89). It makes an employee feel that he or she is of value within the firm.
For this reason, I will make a communication to all the relevant offices and staff members informing them of the intended relocation. This communication is not only meant to inform members of this firm of the intended relocation, but also to prepare them for the planned activities that are to be undertaken because they will be part of the relocation (Dressel 2001, p. 71).
The communication will be made on Monday morning within the week of relocation. On Tuesday, the main activity will be identifying the relevant workforce that would be involved in carrying out various activities on the material day. Eric, the Head House Administrator will play a significant role at this stage. This is because he is the head of the workforce that would be involved in this activity, and that he has experience in supervising a similar activity (Eunson 2012, p. 56).
Working closely with Eric, we will identify the relevant workforce that would be needed to undertake various tasks within this project. Eric and I will view all the equipments that would need to be relocated after which, we will be in a position to determine the exact number of employees that would be needed for this task. By Tuesday evening, the names of all the needed workers will be ready.
The names will be printed the same day ready for use from Wednesday till Sunday. On Wednesday morning, the entire identified workforce will be informed of the intended work over the weekend and there would be a meeting with them at ten in the morning the same day. The majority will be those who have been involved in the previous relocations.
In this team will also be Ian, the IT technician who will be responsible for reconnecting the computer and telephone equipment. In this session, the employees would be given opportunity to share their experience about the previous relocation and how best they think this work can be more successful this time round. Ian, and any other worker who is part of this project, will be expected to identify all the equipment relevant to his or her task in the project.
They will be given the entire afternoon of this day to make this possible. On Wednesday, all the project members will meet in the morning to discuss on the equipment that would be needed for the project. Every project member will inspect the equipment that would be needed on the material day to confirm that they are in the right condition.
On this day, any particular equipment that needs repair will be serviced in order to ensure that they are ready for the task ahead. Eric and I will select team leaders among the project members who will guide other project members in various sections of this project. Ian will be among this group. The group will visit the new premises in order to assess the location and try to figure out how the current call center at the town office will fit into these new premises.
A photo of this new premise will be taken. On Friday, a series of activities will be taken. The first thing in the morning, all the employees working in the play station will be reminded of the intended relocation to a new premise over the weekend. They will be advised to carry home all the personal items they considered very valuable in the evening of the same day (Cheldelin 2008, p. 20).
They will also be expected to lock their desk pedestals and take the key home for the purpose of ensuring that the items will remain intact during the process of relocation. All the project members will be grouped according to the tasks to be taken on the two days, and each team will be headed by the team leader. It is on this day that the plan for the new premise will be made.
Eric and I will take into consideration the need to ensure that the process is as seamless as possible as is desired by the director of this department. In order to achieve this, a photo of the current call center will be taken while the officers are at work in order to have a clear image of how to fit the systems into the new office. At lunch time, all the call center officers will be requested to vacate their workstations for about five minutes.
Another photo of this station will be taken to enhance the planning (Chary 2009, p. 72). This will also help in ensuring that after relocation, the station will be left intact and ready to be used by other officers by Monday morning the following week. In the evening, the entire team will be addressed by Ron Black. It is during this time that Ron will be informed of the planned activities for the following day.
The Activities Involved in the Project
Timing the Activities
The activities in this project are planned to start on Saturday at noon. This is because of a number of reasons. The first reason is the constraint put by Ron, the director of this unit, that the activities cannot be started in the morning based on company policies. The second reason is that traffic movement in the morning hours of Saturdays is always slow.
Starting work in the morning would increase the total time spent in undertaking these activities while our intention is to reduce the time. Lastly, upon sharing with Eric on his experience during the last relocation, he informed me that they spent a lot of time on traffic because they started the work in the morning. As a result of this, the employees got tired even before undertaking all the duties expected of them.
On Saturday, the work shall begin at 12.00 and is expected to end at 18.00 hours. On Sunday, the activities shall commence at 8.00 and end at 18.00 in the evening. This breakdown of the work to be carried out is shown in the appendix. Although the official ending time is planned as 18.00 hours, the project plans show that the work may be completed as early as 14.00 hours.
The four extra hours might be needed by only a single worker, the IT specialist. Eric and I may spend an extra hour after 14.00 hours inspecting both the call center office at the new premise, and the office at the town center if they meet the expectations of the project.
The Activities
All the project members are expected to be at their expected work locations by 12.00. The project members will be in three groups as was planned initially. The first group will be the packing team which will make the majority. The second group will be the transport team, and the last group will be the IT connection group. On Saturday noon when the project commences, the IT officers will help with the relevant disconnections of the telephones and computers.
They will witness how these items are packed so that they will have easier time at the new premise when they will be conducting the reconnection (Andrzej & Buchaman 2007, p. 62). Their day will then come to an end as they will be expected to report the following day by 10.00. The group responsible for unpacking and packing the equipments would start by moving all the computers and telephone kits into the first van.
When all these equipments are safely packed into the first van, the team will come for the desk pedals. I chose to move the entire desk pedestals from the old furniture to the new ones at the new locations, and fit the new pedestals into the old furniture because of two reasons. The first reason was that this would ensure that the contents of desk drawers of the staff would remain intact and safe.
The second reason is because the furniture is standardized and changing the pedestals would be very possible. Every activity would be done within a specified timeframe, as stated in the appendix, and for this reason, all the project members will be warned against taking this project as a jolly overtime task that can be conducted at their own pace as they previously did in the last relocation that took place in this firm.
After packing all the pedestals into the second van, they will be transported to the new premises. The transport officers will then pack the vans ready for unpacking by the second group. The time that the van is expected to take to the new location is also shown in the appendix.
Upon arrival at the new office premises, the packing team will remove the items from the two vans to the new office. When all the items are unloaded from the vans, the transport officers will retire and resume work the following day at ten. Given the time constrain, it is only the desk pedestals that would be fitted.
All the activities of the day will come to a close immediately the pedestals are fitted and the new pedestals are packed ready to be transported to the town offices the following day. On Sunday morning, all the project members, except the transport officers, will report to work by 8.00 in the morning. With the directions from the IT officers, the packing officers will arrange all the computers and telephone kits into the cells ready for connection.
The timing for this activity is shown in the appendix. When they complete this task, they will move all the new pedestals into the van ready to be transported to the town premises. Ian will be left in this new office to undertake the connection process. The other members will use the second van (others may use the space that will remain in the first van because the pedestals may not use the entire space) and we will go back to the town offices.
Upon arrival, the work of transport officers will come to an end immediately. The pedestals will be moved using the lifts to the second floor of the building. The new pedestals will then be fitted into the old furniture at the town office, a process that is expected to take under half an hour. The town office will be ready for use by the new occupants after some cleaning (which is not under the jurisdiction of this project).
When this task is completed, the group shall have completed their task and they would leave for their private activities. According to the estimations, this will be done by 12.00 on Sunday. Eric and I will then move to the new premise to inspect the work done by Ian.
It is expected that by 14.00, Ian should have completed his task of reconnection. The four hour allowance would be given to him only when it is confirmed that it is very necessary. Otherwise, everything will be complete and ready for use by 14.00 at a cost half than which would have been charged by the professional replicators.
References
Andrzej, A & Buchaman, A 2007, Organizational Behavior, Prentice Hall, London.
Blell, D 2011, Emotional intelligence: For the authentic and diverse workplace, Iuniverse Inc, New York.
Chandra, P 2009, Projects Planning, Analysis, Selection, Financing, Implementation, and Review, Tata McGraw Hill, New Delhi.
Charantimanth, P 2003, Total Quality Management, The Free Press, New York.
Chary, S 2009, Production and Operation management, Gale Research, Detroit.
Cheldelin, S 2008, Conflict: From analysis to intervention, Continuum, New York.
Dressel, K 2001, Systemic Risk: A New Challenge for Risk Management, OCED, London.
Eunson, B 2012, Conflict Management, John Wiley & Sons, Hoboken.
Kanji, G 2005, Total Quality Management: Proceedings of the First World Congress, John Wiley and Sons, New York.
Appendix
