Developing operational understanding of service quality through a simulation environment

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to articulate the challenges of learning and improving in service delivery systems – that present managers with imperfect information, confounded variables, and tightly coupled interactions between operational and psychological factors – and present a simulator to assist managers to overcome these challenges.Design/methodology/approach – After reviewing the literature on “learning from simulations” and the main challenges of learning in a service environment, the paper presents the assumptions underlying the service quality management simulator, its interface, and protocols to use it that have proven effective.Findings – It is possible to assist managers to develop operational understanding – what to do, when and how much of it to do – about the drivers of service quality using a simulation environment.Research limitations/implications – In its present form, the simulator only takes a functional definition of service quality and captures the relationships in a busine...