Analyzing Waiting Lines
Analyzing Waiting Lines
Most people find waiting lines irritating – waiting is idle and nonproductive time. From a service system perspective, however, a line represents a demand for service.
Think of a restaurant on a Friday night. As a customer it is an irritation to have to wait 40 plus minutes for a table, but from the restaurant’s perspective, if there is not a line, then that means there are empty tables. Idle services are not good.
So management must balance waiting time with the resources used to provide a service. Health administrators face a duel and potentially conflicting concern. On the one hand, health administrators are concerned about efficiency and worker productivity. Idle staff, machines, and surgical suites benefit neither the organization, the organization’s financial position, nor its potential patients or clients. On the other hand, health administrators want their organization and its staff to be able to provide a quality service when it is needed. Administrators want to minimize, for example, the amount of time a patient must wait for surgery a lab test, or a specific treatment. Delay in providing a service is never good. Long delays may lead to a change or deterioration in the condition of the patient or a lab specimen awaiting a test.
To have an efficient organization as well as efficient service systems and subsystems, managers must balance acceptable waiting times with the input resources used to provide the service. This balancing can be referred to as managing the service system.
Cost of providing the service. This is also known as service cost. Examples include wages paid to servers, the cost of buying an extra machine, and the cost of constructing a new teller window. As a firm increases the size of its staff and provides added service facilities, the result could be excellent customer service with seldom more than one or two customers in a queue. While customers may be happy with the quick response,
Most people find waiting lines irritating – waiting is idle and nonproductive time. From a service system perspective, however, a line represents a demand for service.
Think of a restaurant on a Friday night. As a customer it is an irritation to have to wait 40 plus minutes for a table, but from the restaurant’s perspective, if there is not a line, then that means there are empty tables. Idle services are not good.
So management must balance waiting time with the resources used to provide a service. Health administrators face a duel and potentially conflicting concern. On the one hand, health administrators are concerned about efficiency and worker productivity. Idle staff, machines, and surgical suites benefit neither the organization, the organization’s financial position, nor its potential patients or clients. On the other hand, health administrators want their organization and its staff to be able to provide a quality service when it is needed. Administrators want to minimize, for example, the amount of time a patient must wait for surgery a lab test, or a specific treatment. Delay in providing a service is never good. Long delays may lead to a change or deterioration in the condition of the patient or a lab specimen awaiting a test.
To have an efficient organization as well as efficient service systems and subsystems, managers must balance acceptable waiting times with the input resources used to provide the service. This balancing can be referred to as managing the service system.
Cost of providing the service. This is also known as service cost. Examples include wages paid to servers, the cost of buying an extra machine, and the cost of constructing a new teller window. As a firm increases the size of its staff and provides added service facilities, the result could be excellent customer service with seldom more than one or two customers in a queue. While customers may be happy with the quick response,