Irene Bernhard and Kerstin Grundén
seemed to underestimate the inconvenience of such problems. As more CCs will be implemented in the municipalities, there will however be more experience to learn from in how to handle such dilemmas.
In case A the information system for handling of matters was developed using open‐source software. In case B, there were initial efforts to implement a similar open source‐based system, but due to compatibility problems with other systems, it was not possible to use that system. A consequence of this situation was that there was no functioning electronic system for handling of matters in the initial work at CC, which was problematic. Instead e‐mails were sent from the service administrators to the handling officers at the departments, when a citizen matter was initiated. An information system for handling of matters, was however fully implemented in phase three. In this system all incoming calls were documented and categorised and the progress of handling matters could also be followed, which facilitated the production of statistics.
In case B the system was to be further developed with implementation time limits for the running time of each matter. If the time for handling of a matter exceeds the time limit, a message will be sent to the responsible manager of the department by the service administrators at the CC.
The implementation of CC contributed to some increase in incoming matters from citizens and businesses, a fact that was not foreseen by project management. However, no extra money was added to the costs of handling more matters. As the work processes became more efficient as a consequence of implementing the CCs, this does not seem to have been a major problem.
Registered information as a source for planning and decision‐making
The potential of using registered information as a source for planning and decision‐making was not fully utilized in the municipal organizations, although some statistics were produced. The use of the information could be extended if new categories are used when the data is registered, for example. To use, develop and integrate business intelligence IT‐based tools includes components that support the follow‐up on different levels of an organization( Borking et al., 2011). Poor decision‐making is usually related to not knowing how to use available information or whether the information is sufficient( ibid). Organizations often do not have any structured procedure for handling decisions and there is a lack in both methods and the knowledge by which to identify and analyze problems( ibid, p. ix). The use of the registered information from the contacts with citizens and businesses could help management to improve the understanding of their needs and make conscious decisions based on statistics, affecting the information published on the municipal website and changing work procedures for example. The use of the information could also contribute to quality control and benchmarking.
5. Analysis and discussion of the implementation from the perspective of the employees at the contact centre
There was internal training and education to a varying extent in both cases before the CCs started. There were needs however to have continuous updating of skills as the context of the municipalities was continuously changing in both cases.
One dilemma for the employees in both cases was the fact that some employees had specialist knowledge that they were not allowed to use at the work in the CCs. The municipality guide was not allowed to handle issues of a more complicated nature. In case B all service administrators in the response group for social services should have a background as a social worker in order to be recruited to the CC. Some respondents questioned the need to have highly educated social workers in the CC, and thought that lower degrees of competence were sufficient. The social workers at the response group were not allowed to use all of their specialist competence either.
It is thus a general challenge for management to recruit employees to the CC with relevant background competence, and to offer relevant continuous competence possibilities, in order to counter the monotony and routine aspects of the job and meet competence needs. Such competence development needs could for example be related to the transfer of more work procedures from the back office to CC, and / or to have work rotation among different work tasks. The establishment of career paths for the employees at the CCs could be
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