Due to the above reasons, customer service units are finding it increasingly difficult to keep pace with the competition conditions. The attempt is being made to implement the necessary changes and adjustments by means of reactive partial optimizations, either at the operating process level or by means of “updating” technology and infrastructure.   

The options for evolution run up against their limits here. ­Irrespective of the different development paths taken by various customer service units, we observe the need across all industries to respond to the current demands by making a great leap in ­development. This development leap, generalized in profes­sional journals as “consolidation”, can take place across various levels – strategic, operative, technological. These levels represent merely differences in organizational implementation depths, not an evaluation, which serve as tools for different initial situations and target scenarios. A precise recommendation for a particular consolidation approach is therefore dependent on a more ­detailed analysis of the initial position of the specific situation.

Strategic consolidation promises realization of the greatest­ ­optimization potential

When we use the term “strategic consolidation”, we are referring to organizational changes with the goal of using a legally independent company to perform customer service in the future, i.e. commercially independent customer care in the form of a high-performance, cost-efficient profit center. This is the broadest approach with the highest degree of effectiveness. Possible actions include spin-offs, carve-outs, or classic outsourcing. This formal act implies two fundamental consequences. Being an independent company, the divested customer service unit must work with an eye on being profitable. This in turn means that a strategic restructuring is generally followed by further operative or technological consolidation and optimization measures.    

The realization of such additional optimization measures is simplified by the second consequence from the establishment of an independent service company. Since it is an independent legal entity with central management, the additional consolidation measures required at the operative and technological levels can be conducted and realized more easily.    

The greatest optimization potential can be realized by this form of consolidation because of the function of the customer service operation as a profit center and the expansion of responsibility of the customer service management. Moreover, substantial ­savings can be achieved in the area of payroll costs from the adaptation of collective agreements and employment contracts, depending on the form of the strategic consolidation. But ­during the decision-making process for or against the divestiture of the customer service, the required effort and expense, the ­duration of the process, and the expected start-up costs must not be underestimated.