scholarly journals Knowledge management as a strategic asset for customer service delivery at a contact centre in South Africa

2021 ◽  
pp. 225-249
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Service Delivery ◽  
Customer Service ◽  
Empirical Work ◽  
Transmission Of Knowledge ◽  
World Today ◽  
Usable Knowledge ◽  
The World ◽  
Contact Centre

Knowledge Management (KM) is often touted as a panacea for organisations aiming to be efficient and competitive. While the world today has undoubtedly entered an information era, how organisations convert information to usable knowledge has become of significant importance. Furthermore, the growing emphasis on managing and utilizing knowledge to improve organisational functioning, efficiency and competitiveness has reintroduced KM as a possible strategic asset for organisations. To explore this idea, empirical work was conducted on a contact centre making use of KM practices as a means to enhance the transmission of knowledge to their employees and in turn, to their clients. Further objectives of this research were to identify how KM was understood in this organisation, the benefits and challenges it presented, how it manifested in relation to the idea of leadership and ultimately, if it could be considered a strategic asset for organisations of this nature.

Influence of Knowledge Management Practices on Public Service Delivery by Municipalities

Mousaion ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 37 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Charleen Musonza ◽  
Ndakasharwa Muchaonyerwa
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Service Delivery ◽  
Public Service ◽  
Qualitative Data ◽  
Management Practices ◽  
Integrated System ◽  
Eastern Cape Province ◽  
Eastern Cape ◽  
Public Service Delivery

This study examines the influence of knowledge management (KM) practices on public service delivery by municipalities in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. The study sought to determine the factors that have triggered the implementation of KM practices; the effectiveness of KM practices towards public service delivery; and the extent to which KM practices have influenced public service delivery by municipalities in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. Both quantitative and qualitative methods were employed in this study. Quantitative data were collected through a survey questionnaire administered to a sample of 202 employees at the Raymond Mhlaba Municipality in the Eastern Cape. Qualitative data were collected through observations and interviews of 2 senior managers. The data collected gave a response rate of 72 per cent. The quantitative and qualitative data were analysed descriptively and presented verbatim respectively. The results indicated that the internal and external factors included in this study have contributed to the implementation of KM practices in the municipality. Furthermore, the effective use of KM practices has increased the organisational KM initiative, as well as the provision of services such as electricity, education, transport, and social services by the municipality. The study recommends the establishment of KM awareness and the establishment of an integrated system that will assist in effective knowledge sharing, retention and acquisition across municipalities in the Eastern Cape.

scholarly journals Enhancing accountability in public–private partnerships in South Africa

2019 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 66-92 ◽  
Author(s):  
M C Fombad
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Developing Countries ◽  
Service Delivery ◽  
Public Private Partnerships ◽  
Public Control ◽  
The World ◽  
Alternative Service ◽  
Alternative Service Delivery ◽  
Societal Problems

South Africa, like other developing countries, has joined other nations around the world in resorting to public–private partnerships (PPPs) as an integral strategy to improve its deeply rooted socio-economic, political, fiscal and societal problems and to meet the pressure of attaining the goals of national and international developmental projects. In spite of the reasons advanced for the importance of PPPs as an alternative service-delivery option, several doubts about the efficacy of accountability and suggestions that it may undermine public control have been expressed. Given the importance of accountability, this paper seeks to determine some approaches to enhance accountability in public–private partnerships in South Africa. It identifies some of the accountability challenges and suggests ways of overcoming them.

Knowledge in Police Work

2007 ◽  
pp. 1-24
Author(s):  
Petter Gottschalk
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Public Sector ◽  
Service Quality ◽  
Customer Service ◽  
Police Work ◽  
The Public ◽  
Government Services ◽  
The World ◽  
One Stop ◽  
Natural Solution

The public sector is turning to knowledge management, having recognized that they too face competition in funding and from alternative services. Increasingly, customers of the public sector are demanding higher service quality, particularly in the area of e-government. Services, particularly e-services, are expected to be available all the time with immediate response, simplified, and with one-stop processing. According to Luen and Al-Hawamdeh (2001), knowledge management is thus a natural solution to improve operations and enhance customer service. Large organizations around the world are implementing knowledge management.

Knowledge Sharing at the Overstrand Municipality in Western Cape Hermanus, South Africa

Libri ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 69 (4) ◽  
pp. 325-336
Author(s):  
Belinda Louise May ◽  
Madeleine Fombad
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Service Delivery ◽  
Knowledge Sharing ◽  
Relevant Information ◽  
Western Cape ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
The Public ◽  
Information And Communication ◽  
Formal Strategy

Abstract Service delivery remains a challenge in post-apartheid South Africa, notwithstanding the proactive legislations that have been in place since the end of apartheid in 1994 to ensure that municipalities enhance the developmental path through service delivery. Given the increasing interest in prioritising knowledge sharing in municipalities, this article advocates for knowledge sharing as a tool to improve service delivery at South African municipalities. It investigates knowledge sharing at the Overstrand municipality in Cape Town, South Africa and adopts a qualitative approach, using convenient sampling and semi-structured interviews. South Africa is a multicultural country where municipalities are recovering from the inequalities and disparities of apartheid. The article identifies methods of knowledge sharing; establishes the barriers to effective knowledge sharing; and suggests ways in which knowledge sharing could be enhanced at the municipality. Data was collected from the different departments of the Overstrand municipality. The findings reveal that knowledge sharing continues to remain a challenge although participants understood and recognised its importance. A lack of trust, poor communication between senior and junior colleagues, a lack of incentives and recognition, fear of losing one’s job and the absence of a formal strategy, relevant information and communication technology make knowledge sharing challenging. The article recommends a formal knowledge management strategy; a knowledge sharing culture; the use of ICTs for knowledge management and the need for leaders to champion knowledge sharing in all the departments of the Overstrand municipality. Although there is emerging research on knowledge management in the public sector, there is a dearth of research on municipalities.

scholarly journals KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT UNTUK CUSTOMER SERVICE

2010 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 120
Author(s):  
Lianna Sugandi
Keyword(s):  
Information Technology ◽  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Human Resources ◽  
Human Resource ◽  
Customer Service ◽  
Global Competition ◽  
The World ◽  
E Learning ◽  
Human Resource Education ◽  
Educational Field

Knowledge is a success key in every field aspects. Along with the development in the world nowadays, where globalization is a challenge in every Indonesian human resource to face global competition. In this case, education has important part as media in developing qualified human resources and also as the place where they can be educated in their field. In the development of information technology, it came new systems in several fields including what educational field known as e-learning. Knowledge management (KM) is one implementation of e-learning. There is a concept that gathers all knowledge aspects in easily accessed file or document, and also in hardly accessed as knowledge and experience.Keywords: knowledge management, human resource, education

scholarly journals E-commerce Trends and Opportunities in BRICS countries

2021 ◽  
Vol 93 ◽  
pp. 04012
Author(s):  
Svetlana Gusarova ◽  
Igor Gusarov ◽  
Margarita Smeretchinskiy
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
South Africa ◽  
International Trade ◽  
Information Technologies ◽  
Digital Economy ◽  
New Paradigm ◽  
World Today ◽  
Brics Countries ◽  
Group Cooperation ◽  
The World

Introduction of information technologies, transfer to the digital economy and the development e-commerce are on the agenda all over the world today. BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, China, South Africa) pay great attention to the development of e-commerce and plan to strengthen intra-group cooperation in this area. An increase of the e-commerce is a new paradigm of the development of international trade of the «five» countries. It can become their economic growth driver, especially during the crisis due to the coronavirus pandemic. This problem is important, but still insufficiently studied and not enough reflected in the economic researches. Authors revealed the advantages, problems and the main directions of the development of e-commerce in BRICS countries.

Service Quality in Banking with Special Reference to ICICI Bank Ltd., Tiruchirappalli District

2007 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 18-26 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. Amudha ◽  
C. Vijaya Banu
Keyword(s):  
Quality Of Service ◽  
Customer Satisfaction ◽  
Service Quality ◽  
Service Delivery ◽  
Competitive Advantage ◽  
Customer Service ◽  
Service Industries ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The World

As per the Economic association of Indonesia and India, India has been one of the fastest growing economies in the world since the early 90s and India is fourth largest economy of the world after US in terms of purchasing power parity. This is because of the important role played by the financial sector comprising a large number of well managed banking services both in public and private sectors. India's second largest bank is the ICICI Bank offering a wide range of financial services to its customers through its delivery channels. To attain this sustainable competitive advantage, service industries face a unique challenge of meeting the needs of the customers regularly and continuously. Though mechanized form of activity has its own impact on service delivery performance, many service industries still remain to be manual because there exits no equivalent substitute for personal interaction between the employees of service industry and customers. The optimum mix of technology and people in the service delivery process decides the competitive advantage of an organization. Customer satisfaction is taken as a yardstick for measuring the quality of service and providing excellent customer service decides the effectiveness of service delivery process. Only through excellent customer service, an organization can consistently exceed customer expectations. In order to achieve customer satisfaction, every service organization must understand and improve service delivery process and implement valid and reliable service performance measures to measure the same. To assess the degree of customer satisfaction, a SERVQUAL instrument is administered to study the quality of service and the gaps were identified in the services offered by ICICI Bank, Tiruchirapalli District in all five dimensions of service quality, the overall weighted SERVQUAL score being −1.92. The ICICI Bank Ltd. has to take steps to close the gaps by establishing a service quality information system.

scholarly journals Marketing potentials of the social media tools in the banking market of an emerging country

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. 257-267 ◽  
Author(s):  
Akwesi Assensoh-Kodua
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Social Media ◽  
Service Delivery ◽  
Customer Service ◽  
User Satisfaction ◽  
Financial Services ◽  
Instant Messaging ◽  
Continuance Intention ◽  
Media Usage ◽  
Social Media Tools

There are many facts that attest to the pervasiveness of social media applications in the current world of business. This communication medium is replacing the well-known emails and complimenting the likes of short message service (SMS) and instant messaging and chatting. As part of technology, which is revolutionising the way we do business and live, organizations worldwide are gearing up efforts to take advantage of this phenomenon. In South Africa, the story is the same. However, the Banks in South Africa seems to have problems selling this form of communication to their clientele to augment their service delivery. In view of this, the current study aimed to research into social media concept in South Africa, to highlight its trajectory pros and cons, and investigate why it is not being adopted by these clients, in addition to measuring the continuance intention of those who have accepted banking through social media. It was discovered that, social norm (β=0.579), perceived trust (β=0.510) and user satisfaction (β=0.332), in that order, stood out as the most influencing factors impacting on user acceptance and continuance intention (β=0.384) of social media usage for banking. Perceived behavioural control made no significant impact on users to adopt social media for financial services. As the banking industry keeps investing in the marketing potentials of social media tools for banking, in order to gain competitive advantage in customer service delivery, this social media usage could make a lot of difference when well researched into and managed. In some countries, banking customers are able to do their banking through social media sites, but little is known in South Africa (according to research), regarding the usage of this tool for banking purposes.

Problem – and Promise – in African Journalism

1968 ◽  
Vol 19 (11) ◽  
pp. 1-1
Author(s):  
Bruce Hilton
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Rapid Urbanization ◽  
Technological Revolution ◽  
World Today ◽  
The World ◽  
African Journalism

Twenty editors of Christian newspapers and magazines in Africa came together earlier this year to discuss the challenges of their work. Arriving from points as widely scattered as Ethiopia and South Africa, Lagos and Nairobi, they spent nearly a month at the Africa Literature Center in Kitwe, Zambia, discussing both the theological and the practical. Nearly all serve in areas of rapid urbanization and technological revolution, and nearly all face restriction or censorship from their churches or their governments. Reproduced here are a few of the papers read by seminar participants. They reveal something of life on that changing continent; they also reflect problems that are common to those who try to edit Christians journals anywhere in the world today.

Is there any Justification for Economic Pressure against South Africa?

1979 ◽  
Vol 9 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 24-29
Author(s):  
John Chettle
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Southern Africa ◽  
Economic Pressure ◽  
Henry Kissinger ◽  
South Africans ◽  
World Today ◽  
The World

Henry Kissinger is supposed to have said that the situation in Southern Africa was the most complex in the world today, and I sometimes wonder which of us has more of a problem dealing with it–we South Africans in trying to solve the sometimes intractable dilemmas of a divided and heterogeneous society, or Americans in trying to work out what on earth is going on down there.

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