Your customer service team is busy. Cases keep arriving, people are working hard, and the queue is still growing. Where should you start?
Look at what it takes to handle a case today. The answer may involve the Microsoft Dynamics setup, the process around it or both. Start by making that work visible.
This guide uses an illustrative customer service situation. It does not describe a completed customer project.
1. Follow a real case with the person handling it
Ask an employee to take you through a recent case, from the first message to the final answer. Watch the steps in Microsoft Dynamics and the work happening outside it.
Where do they find the customer’s details? How do they know who should handle the case? Which answers do they need from colleagues? Include the emails, spreadsheets and conversations that keep the work moving.
Then look at a different kind of case. A routine question and a complex complaint may need very different support. One example rarely explains the whole workload.
2. Separate useful work from avoidable work
Some cases take time because the customer’s question needs care. Other time is spent searching, copying or waiting. Those are different problems.
- Searching: people move between screens or systems to find information.
- Repeating: the same details are entered more than once.
- Passing work around: a case changes hands before reaching the person who can answer it.
- Waiting: the next step depends on missing information or an unclear decision.
Ask how often each problem happens and what it costs the team in effort. This helps you choose an improvement that matters in daily work.
3. Choose one change with a clear purpose
Describe the problem in a sentence before choosing a feature. For example: “We spend time deciding who should handle each incoming case.”
From there, examine how cases arrive, which information is available and how ownership is decided. The useful change might be a clearer process, a different Microsoft Dynamics configuration or a combination of both.
Write down what should improve, who needs to be involved and what it will take to make the change. Check what is supported by your current application and licences before committing to an option.
“We want less time spent assigning cases, so the team can spend more time answering customers.”
4. Test it with the people doing the work
Try the proposed change in a suitable test environment. Use realistic examples with the employees who will use it. Include the ordinary cases and the exceptions.
Check whether the new setup actually removes a step or simply moves it somewhere else. Make sure people know what to do when a case does not follow the usual route.
Agree how to introduce the change, explain it to the team and handle questions afterwards. A technically correct setup still needs to work in a busy working day.
5. Go back to the original problem
After the change, review the work with the team. Has the time spent assigning cases changed? Are there fewer handovers? Can people find what they need more easily?
Compare similar work over a useful period and ask what has become easier or harder. Avoid judging success on speed alone: the quality of the customer’s answer matters too.
Keep what works, address what still gets in the way and choose the next improvement based on what you have learned.
A practical starting point
Bring one recent case, the steps involved and the part your team finds difficult. That gives us something concrete to work through together.
Mason Pete works directly with your organisation and the people using Microsoft Dynamics. We understand the process, work through the technical details and help you decide which changes are worth making.