CASE SELECTION AND DESIGN

One of the important stages of case study research is the design and subsequent selection of the case companies. There are a number of different strategies that can be adopted when it comes to case design and hence case selection. The main design choice comes in the number of cases included in the study. This is normally differentiated by single or multiple cases. However, Yin (2003) states that there is a limited distinction between single and multiple case design. He does go on to say that multiple cases can provide more compelling evidence and can be regarded as being more robust. As was discussed in Chapter 3, this research adopts a multiple case study design to allow theory building and theoretical replication of innovation activities within contact centres to be achieved. Theoretical replication can be achieved through multiple case studies as each case is selected to show contrasting results but for predictable reasons. This leads on to understanding why each of the cases were selected for inclusion in this study.

By drawing on the conceptual framework (Figure 5.1) the characteristics of contact centres are used as criteria for selecting the case companies to be included in this study. The design aims to select case contact centres that have these different characteristics.

The potential cases were identified through a number of methods; the industry body for the UK contact centre industry, the Customer Contact Association (CCA), was involved in providing a number of potential cases. The CCA used their members list as well as previous winners of the CCA Innovation and People Award to identify potential case companies for the study. Other industry bodys’ innovation award winners were also identified. The potential case companies were contacted both through an e-mail via the CCA or directly from the researcher, this e-mail included a short description of the project and the involvement that would be required from the contact centre if they took part in the study.

contact centre characteristics defined in the conceptual framework. During the selection of the case companies it was thought that the sector was also an important characteristic to consider.

Table 5.1- Composition of case companies Case Company Direction of contact Customers Nature of services

Size Ownership Location Sector

BBC/Capita Inbound Consumers Complex customer services

Small Outsourced City centre, Glasgow

Public

DVLA Inbound Consumer Simple customer services

Large In-house Business park, Cardiff

Public

NCR Inbound &

Outbound Business Complex technical helpdesk

Large In-house Business park, Bellshill Private The Good Morning Project

Outbound Consumer Simple customer services

Small In-house City centre, Glasgow

Public

Dell Inbound &

Outbound Consumer & Business Complex technical helpdesk

Large In-house City centre, Glasgow

Private Simple

sales

Although Table 5.1 outlines the cases and the characteristics that each case has it does not justify why the cases are included in this study. Yin (2003) states that “every case should serve a specific purpose within the overall scope of inquiry” (pp. 47), therefore Table 5.2 outlines why each of the cases has been deemed suitable for inclusion within this study.

Table 5.2 – Justification for cases to be included in this study Case Company Justification for Inclusion in this Study

BBC/Capita This is an outsourced contact centre although it deals with a public sector client. It is one of the founding members of the CCA and so it was thought that this centre would be an established centre with good practices embedded with its operations.

DVLA This centre is a technology focused centre that has the largest IVR in the UK and is also an in-house public sector contact centre. The publication of the Varney report has resulted in in-house public sector contact centres going through many changes – this centre was included to show if these changes have implications for innovation. NCR This centre is a multi-lingual centre that deals with complex inquiries from business customers - it was included into this study as it deals with business customers using high skill level employees.

The Good Morning Project

This is a contact centre which has outbound operations but this centre deals with providing a service rather than outbound sales which are common within the industry.

Dell This contact centre was used as it contains both sales and technical help, as well as business and consumer customers, within the same centre, therefore the

implications of service and customer type can be investigated within one organisation.

Table 5.1 and Table 5.2 show the cases that are included in this research project and identify why they are included in the study and state the characteristics that each case has. The empirical findings (presented in Chapter 6) discuss each of the cases in further detail as part of the within-case analysis.

What can be seen from the selection of case companies is that although there is a wide selection of different contact centres there is a bias towards Glasgow as a geographical location, mainly because Glasgow is a geographical cluster for contact centres within the UK. The selection also shows that there is a bias towards inbound services, due to the fact that the industry as a whole is moving away from outbound ‘cold-calling’, and because of the offshoring of much of the outbound services there are few outbound centres located in the UK.

Once the case companies are selected and access is gained the next main phase of the research is to collect the data that will be used to answer the research questions.

The research philosophy, approach and strategy were discussed in Chapter 3 in relation to how they shape the research - these methodological decisions have an impact on the way the data is collected and the methods that are used. The strategy employed is one of empirical case study, and one of the fundamental characteristics of case research is the ability to use a number of tools and techniques for data collection. Yin (2003) highlights this eclectic mix of sources of data in Table 5.3.

Table 5.3 - Data sources in case research (Yin, 2003) Source of

Evidence

Strengths Weaknesses

Documentation  Stable-can be reviewed repeatedly

 Unobtrusive-not created as a result of the case study  Exact-contains exact names,

references, and details of an event

 Broad coverage-long span of time, many events, and many settings

 Retrieveability-can be low  Biased selectivity, if collection

is incomplete

 Reporting bias-reflects (unknown) bias of author  Access-may be deliberately

blocked

Archival Records  (Same as above for documentation)

 Precise and quantitative

 (Same as above for documentation)

 Accessibility due to privacy reasons

Interviews  Targeted-focuses directly on case study topic

 Insightful-provides

perceived causal inferences

 Bias due to poorly constructed questions

 Response bias

 Inaccuracies due to poor recall  Reflexivity-interviewee gives

what interviewer wants to hear Direct

Observations  Reality-covers events in real time  Contextual-covers context of

event

 Time-consuming  Selectivity-unless broad

coverage

 Reflexivity-event may proceed differently because it is being observed

 Cost-hours needed by human observers

Participant

Observations  (Same as above for direct observations)  Insightful into interpersonal

behaviour and motives

 (Same as above for direct observations)

 Bias due to investigators manipulation of events Physical

Artefacts  Insightful into cultural features  Insightful into technical

operations

 Selectivity  Availability

Although the number of data collection methods facing case study researchers can be confusing, the research questions and conceptual framework of the research can

direct the type of data collection methods used. To this end Table 5.4 outlines the link between the research questions and the data collection methods employed.

Table 5.4 – Rational for data collection methods

Research Question Data collection methods