Introduction
To a great extent, Torpedo Trains company has deteriorated customer satisfaction and performance. Therefore, as a consultant who has commenced working with the entity, the main objective will be to investigate the causal factors and develop a structured venture improvement plan to address the issues. The client contentment survey and the public performance measure have helped showcase the company’s production rate and passenger gratification levels decline. The report will provide possible solutions to the upcoming effects of the modern freight flows and how they influence Torpedo Trains’ performance and operation and will be addressed to the Torpedo Trains board of directors.
The Causes of the Deterioration in Performance and Customer Satisfaction Levels
Data Collection Methodologies
The first part of the report works on achieving the third learning outcome of assessing client satisfaction and performance data sets and information and recommending solutions to enhance service delivery. The main data collection methods to establish the decline in customer satisfaction and company performance levels include interviews and surveys. Regarding the survey, a list of questions is distributed in person, by mail, or online for the passenger respondents to complete (Scot Rail, 2022). After that, the data is analyzed and compared to the previous year concerning satisfaction and performance levels. At the same time, the interviews are conducted by the researcher, who asks various queries in person or by phone and records the responses.
The main rationale for using railway-related methods and techniques such as customer satisfaction surveys is that they assist in gauging the representativeness of one’s perspectives and experiences. Through surveys, a researcher can retrieve critical individual views, which are utilized to make essential decisions (Department for Transport, 2021). On the other hand, the interviews can be used to gather data on a limited sample size of a population, which represents the general views of the community members and helps in retrieving essential information based on people’s behaviors.
Key Business Causes of the Deterioration in Performance and Customer Satisfaction Levels
The most suitable data gathering methodology deployed for identifying core venture causes of the deterioration in performance and customer satisfaction levels in the Torpedo Trains company is a survey. Nationally, in the United Kingdom, the overall production of railway operating companies has been reduced, spearheaded by the deterioration of client satisfaction levels. The fishbone diagram indicates the main root causes for declined performance and contentment, including service delivery, accessibility, cost, lack of modern technology, and poor management (Foster, 2018). One of the key root causes of customer dissatisfaction is the lack of proper train schedules for particular routes, resulting in delays and making the customers unable to reach their stipulated destinations (Mind Tools, 2022a). The main routes for the train operation are High City, Blue City, Purple City, and Yellow City. The failure to follow the terms of the concession agreement and customer and performance service can have detrimental effects on the success of the Torpedo Trains company.
Significantly, a customer contentment survey measures a wide range of key service delivery areas across the trains and stations that are essential to the passengers using Torpedo Trains. From December 2018 to December 2019, the general satisfaction level of the customers declined from 86% to 83% due to poor train and station facilities during Torpedo Trains’ intercity operations (Giangregorio, 2020). Concerning the train facilities, some key drivers causing the reduced performance and customer satisfaction include minimal staff on the train, poor tackling of delay, poor reliability of internet connection, uncleanliness, and inadequate toilet amenities. In addition, there are massively uncomfortable seats, unrepaired trains, wrong journey times, and insufficient luggage space (Harris et al., 2016). The general environment, including the shelter amenities’ conditions and the employees’ overall attitude, have substantially contributed to customer satisfaction and performance deterioration.
Many organizations, including Torpedo Trains, have elevated accessibility challenges, escalating the decline in operator performance and satisfaction levels. One of the core prerequisites for passengers is accessibility to the railway. Even though the British government enacted the Equality Act of 2010, many stations of the Torpedo Trains are not accessible to people, particularly people with disabilities, elderly citizens, and pregnant mothers (Harris et al., 2016). Therefore, the discrimination has made the clients dissatisfied with the services provided by the station operators.
There are multiple stakeholders involved with Torpedo Trains’ business operations. Firstly, the lack of integration of critical stakeholders, including the Department of Transport (DfT) and the Ministry of Justice, has resulted in the decline of people using the railway as their favorite mode of movement, and they have a high level of influence on the venture (Department for Transport, 2021). Secondly, National Rail is a primary stakeholder and greatly impacts Torpedo Trains’ business activities. For example, the lack of the acquisition of essential operating licenses by Torpedo Trains management from National Rail has made the management neglect to comply with disabled people’s protection policy. Other crucial stakeholders include the customers, who greatly impact the enterprise as they determine whether the company will continue its daily activities based on their habits and trends. Lastly, other crucial stakeholders include the Torpedo Trains staff, even though they have low influence on the venture. However, the lack of engagement with the executive team has resulted in the deterioration of services, leading to lower satisfaction levels of clients.
Even though ticket booking acts as a national service and can be undertaken by telephone, at stations, or via the Torpedo Trains website, passengers have continued to face challenges. The deterioration of operator performance and client contentment is due to the failure to comply with the railways (interoperability) regulations of 2011, which established the accessibility requirements for the heavy train industry for individuals with declined mobility (Harris et al., 2016). At the same time, the rail vehicle accessibility (non-interoperable rail system) Act of 2010 provided guidelines and prerequisites for metro systems and light rails (Giangregorio, 2020). In addition, most passengers believe that the delays caused and the affordability cost of the tickets do not match.
The train journeys and schedules are not followed despite the Torpedo railway management escalating the transportation fares. In every company, when the organizational structure does not embed a culture of following set rules and regulations, business operations decline, which impacts venture outcomes, such as customer satisfaction levels (Rail Magazine, 2021). To a great extent, diesel-fueled trains are slow and do not fulfill client satisfaction, particularly ecologically sensitive ones. Failure to integrate technology can harm operator performance and client contentment in any business.
Potential Solutions for Customer Satisfaction Deterioration
Notably, several projected solutions have considerable pragmatic and economic feasibility in the sophisticated railway and business environment. Torpedo Trains management must adopt customer profiling to handle the issue of poor service delivery, which has caused a decline in performance and satisfaction. The profiling helps deliver real information to the clients, which escalates the number of loyal customers, thus increasing performance and passenger contentment. The availability of attracting valuable new users and retaining loyal clients increases the profitability of the economy and minimizes the costs of reaching them, such as marketing (Network Rail, 2022a). Proper utilization of railway modeling techniques incorporated with quarterly surveys and data collection helps analyze and improve the issues faced by the clients.
Adopting the new technology is essential to curb the key business causes of deterioration in operator performance and customer satisfaction. The traffic management controls will help ensure that the train’s journeys and schedules are followed without delays. In that case, the passengers arrive at their chosen destination on time. The Torpedo company management must ensure they have modern trains that use hydrogen tractions. Significantly, an economically sensitive company will not have more clients but save on the increase caused for the maintenance of trains and fuel costs, which causes affordability issues. The organization should embrace a work culture whereby the staff follows the set work codes to ensure they have improved customer relationships (Harris et al., 2016). In addition, working in partnership with the specifier, Torpedo Trains can substantially enhance intercity services and connectivity, resulting in small-time journey improvements.
With declined operator productivity and customer contentment, the business can fail to achieve its expected profitability target due to poor service to the passengers. The Torpedo executive must ensure there are flexible management practices to facilitate an environment of having an open conversation regarding client satisfaction between the staff and managers. It ensures that employees have a positive attitude and report on the key issues in the facilities that require immediate action (Network Rail, 2022b). Training workers in customer service skills are essential and can increase the company’s productivity levels and ensure the company has many referrals, resulting in improved profitability.
Key Lessons from the Case Study and Why the Business is Critical
One of the main lessons from the Torpedo Train’s case study is that when the customers are dissatisfied, the company profits decline immensely. Secondly, the company executive team must ensure frequent customer profiling to determine the primary causes of deteriorated contentment among clients and how to enable them to increase the firm’s productivity. Another takeaway point is that the organizational culture of Torpedo must not focus on operation efficiency but be customer-oriented. For example, adequate training of workers will make them acquire adequate skills to manage client complaints effectively and ensure improved profitability. Business criticality refers to factors necessary for a venture to succeed (Dudenhoefer, 2018. The Torpedo Trains management must ensure that factors, including financial loss, legal violations, personal safety, and reputation damage, negatively impact their business criticality.
An Improvement Plan to Address Key Areas of Concern and Underlying Issues
The second part of the report aims to address the outcome of applying business improvement methodologies to enhance a real service delivery issue and analyze and recommend advancements to service delivery to escalate performance and client contentment. The business improvement plan (BIP) is substantially generated in the event of material changes to a budget to solicit ideas that improve performance, enable cost savings, and generate extra revenue. The BIP will enable the Torpedo Trains board to capture all crucial databases for upcoming initiatives undertaken by the company management. In that case, the primary key areas of concern include human factors, service delivery, and railway infrastructure conditions. At first, the company engaged in the timetable change and restructured the drivers and train staff diagrams, resulting in additional services and improved efficiency (South Western Railway, 2020). However, not recruiting more staff shows that Torpedo Trains’ workforce will have a poor attitude and relationship with clients. The employee stress shows the company continues to experience deteriorated performance and lower client satisfaction as they lack enough manpower to handle the services provided. Even though trains are all driver-controlled operations, the incorporation of the intercity services indicates the number of on-board subordinates must increase to provide catering and customer services.
The inadequacy of staff to restock the train and clear the rubbish at all the intercity routes shows the company faces a key concern regarding the human workforce. In addition, since Torpedo Train operates under a concession agreement, it has limited control of its undertakings and must incur expenses to maintain poor railway infrastructural conditions. The key underlying issues are cost and affordability, which may impact customer satisfaction and operational performance. The company must buy limited stabling facilities at High City, indicating that it is spending much compared to its budget. Even though the company operates on four routes, its fleet of thirty-four 10-car electric multiple units is serviced and cleaned overnight at Blue City, which has a restricted hostage capacity (Office of Rail and Road, 2022a). Therefore, most trains do not operate per schedule, making the company spend the generated profits on securing limited stabling.
Integrating the Lean Model with the Improvement Plan
Integrating the lean model will ensure the management creates a value stream mapping tracks to allow the Torpedo Trains subordinates to eliminate wasteful processes. Therefore, escalating the team’s efficiency, value flow, and productivity will ensure the effective delivery of services to the customers. Notably, adopting the lean methodology will ensure the hiring the right number of customer-oriented staff members, abolishing unnecessary costs and thus improving efficiency (Dudenhoefer, 2018). In addition, the lean approach allows improved stakeholder visibility and strong client relationships. The National Rail, Department of Transport, Torpedo Trains management, and sponsors will be involved to ensure all the customer demands are met.
The Changes Proposed with Timeframes
One of the key changes proposed is transformation and technological adoption. Railway contractual companies like Torpedo Trains have not yet fully embraced automation. The process mapping will help have a proper flow of activities in the timeframe to attain the intended results (Lucid Software Inc, 2022). The planned timeframe for the technological acquisition change to be accomplished will be from 1 February 2023 to 30 August 2023. The entity must use trains embedded with modern types of traction, improving the quality of the railway industry while reinforcing economies in operation via enhancing performance. Implementing a train control system, traffic management system, and signaling will not only reduce expenses and improve safety but will continue driving modernization (London North Eastern Railway, 2019). Even though there are high installation costs, having a time-saving system results in productivity and commercial benefits.
Having driverless metro systems, which replace the driver control trains, increases performance in fault diagnosis and alerting trains and ensures improved maintenance, particularly in secured limited stablings. Technological benefits will be realized with layout changes and infrastructure upgrades, resulting in increased customer satisfaction due to improved service delivery. However, safety standards and regimes require review to rhyme with proposed innovations. The availability of high-speed trains helps clients traverse different locations as scheduled (Harris et al., 2016). The technology helps in the booking by the passengers, resulting in the acquisition of affordable tickets. It enables faster delivery of real information to the customer regarding schedule changes and any expected delays.
Nevertheless, another proposed change is embracing a new organizational culture to realize enhanced service delivery. Within Torpedo Trains venture, an overarching culture, ethos, and how activities are executed exists. Deteriorated customer satisfaction and declined operational performance show the company’s work culture is not feasible. The norms of behavior between teams and managers are poor, indicating poor leadership style, which has resulted in the development of a negative attitude by the employees toward passengers (Scot Rail, 2022). To a great extent, the company size, including the number of workers and physical magnitude, is highly small. In that case, the company should ensure the integration of stakeholders and workers while making decisions to enable the employment of more workers, which will drive the delivery of good railway services to the customers.
The company must engage other stakeholders, including the rail network, which controls railway operations. Ventures require change due to transpositions in new markets, business rivalry, external environment, stakeholder prerequisites, and organization restructuring (Harris et al., 2016). When employees have positive behavior, they perform well, adhering to the rules of undertaking job duties and responsibilities and following government policies at the workplace. Even though Torpedo management cannot change the attitude of workers, having a workable and operational organizational structure provides a supportive environment, motivation, and psychological capital to subordinates. The expected timeframe for the organization’s structural culture change to be completed will be from 1 December 2023 to 1 April 2023. In doing so, all the stakeholders will be engaged and avoid any change resistance, which might continue making Torpedo Trains encounter poor service delivery, leading to deteriorated customer satisfaction and performance.
The Expected Management and Governance Arrangements
Regarding the management arrangement and governance arrangements, the chief executive officer should have overall accountability and appoint committees that oversee service delivery to the customers. Notably, the position of the deputy must be scrapped and replaced with vice presidents, who manage other managers, such as human resource leaders, operation, fleet, commercial, and sales directors. There must be workforce management, auditing and risk control, information steering, property services, and financial and asset regulation governance committees (South Western Railway, 2020). The company should deploy both public-private governance arrangements, whereby the train passengers, employees, the British government, and Torpedo Trains have a concession contract on delivering effective services. The projected outcomes involve having a responsive entity, linking downwards from the executive, vice presidents, and other stakeholders. The increased member engagement will ensure better service delivery, and the staff will feel more empowered to act.
The Impact on the Business Plan
To a great extent, Torpedo Trains’ business plan offers structure and defines venture management goals. With feasible governance and leadership arrangements, the stakeholders will work together to make decisions, keeping the business on track with operational milestones, service delivery, and sales targets (Dudenhoefer, 2018). In addition, the company’s managers would ensure all the key priority areas of the venture plan are measured and regulated effectively to improve performance and customer satisfaction. The management will help ensure the proper course of action and analysis of the attached financial implications of the business plan on the Torpedo railway business and ensure the company reaches the breakeven point within a shorter period while offering improved services to the customers.
The Importance of Business Organization and Contract Management
The contract management and business organization of Tordepo Trains have significant importance and have a tremendous consequence on the business plan for the proposed changes. Significantly, effective agreement control and venture organizations help save money and time. The concession contracts are expensive to maintain, and proper management helps oversee payments, improve productivity, ensure quality delivery of passenger services, and help provide information to adhere to the set obligations. Good organizational skills help eliminate manual work and digitally offer services (London North Eastern Railway, 2019). Therefore, the Torpedo company will realize more profits and reduce poor performance and deteriorated contentment of clients as established in the business plan.
The contract management ensures that venture-associated uncertainties and monetary penalties for non-compliance are controlled. Therefore, the bargaining power and the business reputation are sustained in the long run. The customers will not get overpriced for the purchased tickets, and the workers will have improved motivation to help the passengers when the company is well-operated (Irish Rail, 2022). The business organization helps comply with taxes, adhere to government policies, and pay taxes (South Western Railway, 2020). Unifying agreements assist the company management in having a stronger development of future negotiations. The Torpedo Trains leadership will ensure all the contracted suppliers offer effective services. Contract management provides the prospective acceleration of conciliation cycles, reduces processing and processing costs, and minimizes erroneous payments.
Impact of Improvement Plan and Timetable Changes
To a great extent, the improvement plan mandates Torpedo company to hire more staff members and train them to ensure that they provide exceptional services to the customers, resulting in increased contentment and improved productivity of the business entity. Therefore, the firm will not incur extra costs, whereby they manage railway operations and pay employees, but they have declined clients booking their transportation services. The timetable changes, including embarking on automation, will enable time-saving, resulting in many clients preferring the Torpedo trains services (Dudenhoefer, 2018). In addition, the company executive must embrace a customer-oriented corporate culture. Motivated workers with positive attitudes will ensure the proper implementation of their skills to enhance service delivery and ensure the entity’s improved profitability.
The Potential Impact and the Stand of Torpedo Train in Determining the Ultimate Plan
To a great extent, there is no known proposal on what will help increase customer satisfaction through effective service delivery. However, one immediate and defined potential impact will be ensuring that Torpedo Trains offers improved services to increase client contentment and record the company’s high profitability. The current status of the Torpedo company is that it faced the challenge of deteriorated performance and escalated client dissatisfaction. For the prospective impact to occur, the rights of Torpedo Trains, including ensuring the maintenance of the business and continuing with the transportation of commodities and people to their preferred destination, must be preserved. Therefore, the ultimate plan will keep Torpedo Trains as an operator despite the changes and continue recording increased profitability. The sponsors will substantially influence determining whether the deteriorated satisfaction and productivity will be reduced. Through funds and constant progress appraisal by the sponsor, Torpedo Trains will provide improved service delivery to the customers. The contractual obligations mandate Torpedo Trains to ensure the effective transportation of commodities and people to the preferred destinations without harm or damage.
Problem Definition and the Tools Used Concerning Torpedo Trains
The defined problem to be prioritized is the issue of deteriorated customer satisfaction and performance due to poor service delivery to the customers. The company has an issue with proper scheduling and has inadequate trains on various routes to transport products to various destinations. Therefore, in handling daily activities, the company must utilize available tools, including Lean Six Sigma, to improve the efficiency of the services used. For example, the lean methodology adoption by Torpedo will ensure the hiring of the best workers. The staff members with the required skills will increase customer value and enhance the performance of Torpedo Trains (Scot Rail, 2022). In addition, the company’s failure to undertake maintenance and repairs of the train’s physical facilities is the primary reason for its deteriorating performance (Management Study Guide, 2021). Integrating technology and embracing intermodal services will result in mixed-traffic railways that will help solve the identified and defined issue of deteriorated performance, leading to massive customer dissatisfaction.
The increased delays have resulted in a decline in the productivity of Torpedo Trains. The use of process mapping will help Torpedo Trains management to identify bottlenecks and delays by brainstorming ideas to enhance the company’s performance (Irish Rail, 2021). Torpedo The lack of reconciling the passenger and freight market variations prompts. The avoidance of not following contractual obligations results in the revocation of the business operator license by Network Rail (Harris et al., 2016). The operator must work closely with the specifier having a concession contract and the infrastructure manager with a track access agreement to ensure all the set guidelines are followed.
The Key Features of the Freight Sector Differentiating it from the Passenger Sector and Pathing Cargo Train
The sector’s initial characterization of the freight market is stability, indicating how easily a cargo train can be loaded, stored, and stacked. One key feature of the freight sector is liability, whereby most of the products transported in the market can be stolen, damaged, or mishandled. To a great extent, freight is extremely prone to spontaneous combustion, explosions, and breaking, indicating an excessive burden to the clients and high maintenance costs to the operating company (London North Eastern Railway, 2019). The other characteristic of the freight market is reliability, whereby the cargo trains move to the required destinations without making many stoppages on the intercity routes (The Guardian, 2020). A noticeable feature of the passenger sector is the high human resource availability. The scheduling and management of the customers require employees to undertake maintenance of facilities, help book tickets, and clean the trains. Another characteristic of the passenger train market is sentience, whereby humans can make personal decisions, making the lives of the operators easier (Network Rail, 2022a). People can take care of themselves without needing to develop emergency safety traps and board and leave the train without assistance. At the same time, the rail yards and the stabling units must be manned and equipped with modern machinery for unloading and loading heavy cargo.
How Differences are Reconciled to Deliver an Efficient Mixed Traffic Railway
Through proper business organization and delegation of services, and adaptation of the technology, the discrepancies between passenger and freight markets can be eliminated to achieve a sufficient mixed-traffic railway. Routine utilization optimization by carrying individuals and cargo reduces environmental impact (The Guardian, 2020). The integrated traffic routes experience typical track issues, including rail wear, discrete defects, rolling contact fatigue, and plastic deformation. The higher axle loads, new drive system, faster-traveling spends, and escalated train frequencies spearheaded by the lean Six Sigma are key in reconciling the differences and ensuring no infrastructure capacity constraints facing Torpedo Trains (Office of Rail and Road, 2022b). The deployment of rail technology using optimized railway tracks enables the Torpedo Trains management to tackle the issue of rail wear and crack formation that can cause customer service delivery delays. Due to the limited routes and inadequate structure, rolling stock makes mixed-traffic railways effective. Therefore, the financial costs would decrease, making the company record high profits as the customer will become satisfied with the offered services.
Case Analysis
The Torpedo Trains case study shows that the company faces challenges of increased dissatisfaction and deterioration of its productivity. The company’s executive team has embraced a product-oriented corporate culture, concentrating on operational efficiency instead of delivering good services to their clients. A business entity’s organizational structure must incorporate its clients’ needs (Giangregorio, 2020). Therefore, the company management must utilize the lean sigma model and the customer profiling strategy to identify the main causes of their declined contentment. There is a need to embrace alternatives, such as having intermodal freights to ensure faster delivery of commodities and enable people to reach their preferred destination speedily.
Conclusion
The Torpedo Trains have continued to experience deteriorated customer satisfaction and operator performance. The primary drivers for client contentment and productivity decline include poor organizational culture, lack of feasible technology, and weak service delivery. The management of Torpedo Trains requires embracing technological advancements such as having traffic control regulations and changing its organizational structure to enable an easy decision-making process, enhancing employees’ behavior and motivating them.
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