ARCHSECRET model

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The ARCHSECRET model is a customer-oriented , multi-attribute measurement method for the performance quality of non-profit organizations (NPOs for short) in the service sector ( tertiary sector ). The model is based on the evaluation of studies of service quality assessment in the public and welfare-related sectors in Scotland .

Basis of the model

Need of the model

The increased competition for funds has forced non-profit organizations to adopt more marketing-oriented management. This also includes a mostly certified quality management system . To do this, however, a new model for measuring service quality had to be developed. This should be specially tailored to the NPOs. Universally usable measurement methods led to inconclusive results.

The SERVQUAL model , which was used as standard to measure service quality , has been criticized for a long time . The biggest point of criticism was the lack of flexibility of the model for the various areas of application. It is especially not suitable for non-profit organizations. That is why a new model for measuring service quality was developed specifically for this purpose. This new measurement method was intended to be a multi-indicator system for measuring the service quality of NPOs. It is based on the SERVQUAL model.

The study

The ARCHSECRET model is based on a study by Liz Vaughan and Edward Shiu that was carried out in Scotland between 1995 and 2000. Both authors were lecturers at Glasgow Caledonian University.

The study was carried out in institutions that offer services for people with disabilities. The offers for people with disabilities include a wide range of different services. These services are at different levels of Maslow's hierarchy of needs , since different amounts of help have to be offered for people with disabilities. Therefore, the results of the study made it more valid.

In the first phase a qualitative study was carried out in which 7 groups were asked about the service quality of care institutions. The 7 groups consisted of service recipients with disabilities, legal guardians and voluntary care assistants.

The first group included inpatients from the Perth area. The second group consisted of patients in a day care facility in the Edinburgh area. The third group consisted of people who received employment assistance in the Glasgow area. The fourth group consisted of guardians of children under the age of 16 attending school from the Edinburgh area. The fifth group consisted of the legal guardians of beneficiary children under the age of 16 from the Edinburgh area. The last two groups were volunteer nurses from Glasgow and Edinburgh, respectively. 40 statements were determined from the answers of the various groups. 21 of these statements could then be related to 6 of 10 dimensions of the SERVQUAL model. The remaining 19 statements were combined into 6 sector-specific new dimensions.

The 6 dimensions of the SERVQUAL model include tangibles (tangible environment), reliability, responsiveness, competence, security and communication. The six dimensions newfound loud Humanness ( humanity ), service provision level (service levels), bargaining Exchange, Enabling / empowerment (empowerment), Access (accessibility) and equity (fairness).

The statistical evaluation followed in the second phase. The sector-specific dimensions were now formed from the 40 statements by checking stochastic dependencies using the statistical software SPSS. The 40 statements were examined for various characteristics and thus the dependency of some statements was determined. This resulted in 27 components of the service quality measurement from the 40 statements. These 27 components are called indicators. The summary only lost 1% of the information, which is why this was done.

The dimensions were obtained by combining statements of the same type. To find out the relationship between statements, the correlation of the indicators was calculated. There are two different methods of testing for reciprocal relationships between statements. On the one hand, it is examined whether pairwise correlations occur and, on the other hand, the reciprocity of groups. You test whether several statements agree. With these two methods 6 pairs of two statements each and four groups of more than two statements could be formed. This statistical test procedure resulted in the 10 ARCHSECRET dimensions with the corresponding indicators. The degree of agreement of some statements was so great that one indicator is ultimately sufficient for these dimensions.

The model

Assignment to the measurement method group

The ARCHSECRET model belongs to the customer-oriented, subjective, feature-oriented and multi-attribute measurement methods.

In the case of subjective measurement methods, the focus is on the quality perception of individual customers, in contrast to the objective measurement method, in which the indicators are “objectified”.

However, there are different approaches within the subjective survey of how to proceed with the quality measurement. A distinction is made here between the feature-oriented, event-oriented or problem-oriented approach. The ARCHESECRET model uses the feature-oriented approach. The overall assessment is made up of the assessment of several subordinate criteria. The assessment is usually carried out using customer questionnaires, which were created using the multi-attribute method. Several quality features are evaluated and these are then summed up in order to arrive at a complete quality measurement. The ARCHSECRET model uses a mixture of attitude-oriented and satisfaction-oriented questions.

The 10 dimensions

As an acronym, the 10 dimensions form the name of the model.

A stands for the dimension Access. What is meant by this is the willingness of the non-profit organization to give all individuals who are dependent on their performance access to their services. In order to be allowed to receive the service, the NPO may set conditions. However, these conditions must be kept within reasonable limits.

R denotes the dimension of responsiveness. What is meant here is that the non-profit organization provides its service immediately and on time, but also that the NPO reacts flexibly to customer requests.

C stands for communication. What is meant by this is to conduct conversations with customers in an understandable and polite manner, and also to be willing to listen to customer opinions.

H denotes the dimension humanness (humanity). This means that the recipient's privacy, fears and worries are respected.

S stands for security. The point here is to offer the beneficiary security and security.

E denotes the dimension enabling or empowerment (empowerment). The point here is to support the recipient of the service individually, above all through a personally tailored environment within the non-profit organization, whereby the recipient is given targeted support, further education or training.

C stands for Competence. What is meant here is the offer of a range of services tailored to the recipient.

R denotes the dimension reliability. It is about the constant maintenance of the agreed standards of performance. The reliability is strongly influenced by the actions of the employees. Your appearance and actions determine the reliability of the service.

E stands for equity (justice). This dimension is about the ability of the NPO to provide services to groups and individuals in a fair and equitable manner.

T stands for Tangibles (tangible environment). This term summarizes all physical performance components that are required to provide the service. For example, buildings, equipment and interior fittings belong to the tangible environment.

The 27 indicators

3 indicators are assigned to the Access dimension:

  1. Willingness to negotiate the conditions for receiving benefit with beneficiaries.
  2. Ensuring that rooms, staff, equipment, means of communication and the service itself are accessible.
  3. Information is provided on possible financial support; the non-profit organization also advises the beneficiary accordingly.

The responsiveness dimension includes the following 4 indicators:

  1. The service recipients receive the service promptly and promptly.
  2. The reaction to customer complaints leads to the further development of the service.
  3. The NPO stands up for the rights of service recipients and, if necessary, fights for them.
  4. The services can be offered flexibly, ie an individual adaptation to the needs of the service recipient is possible.

Communication also includes 4 indicators:

  1. The non-profit organization is always polite and courteous when it comes to customer care.
  2. The NPO listens to individual customer points of view.
  3. The conversations with customers are designed on a linguistic level so that the customer understands the conversation.
  4. The service recipient receives complete and correct information, which is made available to him promptly.

The following 4 indicators are assigned to the humanness dimension:

  1. Customers get confidence in dealing with their fears, worries and concerns.
  2. The employees are always empathetic and take into account the individual needs of the customers.
  3. Confidential information and feelings of the beneficiaries are respected and subject to confidentiality.
  4. Customer privacy is always respected.

The security dimension includes 2 indicators:

  1. The customer service is designed in such a way that the customer is given security and security.
  2. The customer data is recorded correctly and securely.

The dimension enabling / empowerment includes 2 indicators:

  1. The environment is to be designed by the non-profit organization in such a way that the beneficiaries can develop independently.
  2. Specific opportunities are created and support is offered to help clients achieve their individual goals.

The competence dimension includes 3 indicators:

  1. The required level of service is kept constant and provided under clearly defined conditions of use.
  2. The NPO employs the required number of appropriately trained or trained employees in order to provide the service at the promised level of performance.
  3. The non-profit organization offers the full range of services in order to be able to respond to individual customer requests.

The reliability dimension includes 3 indicators:

  1. The NPO provides the agreed service in full.
  2. The recipient of the service can rely on the timely provision of the service. The time course of the service provision (patient view) is always the same.
  3. The behavior and demeanor of the NPO employees gives the customer a feeling of trust and reliability.

The equity dimension can be described with an indicator:

  1. The service is provided in a fair and equitable manner for all groups and individuals.

The Tangibles dimension includes the following indicator:

  1. A full range of modern equipment is available to the customer.

Measurement method / type of measurement

The recipients of the service receive a questionnaire in which the dimensions and indicators are listed. They use two scales to evaluate their expectations (“expectation scale”) and the degree of fulfillment (“perception scale”) of the individual indicators. Both scales range from 1 to 7, with 1 standing for “I totally disagree” and 7 for “I totally agree”.

The service quality can then be determined from the difference between the two scales. The difference between the values ​​is always between −6 and +6. The rule is: the higher the value, the better the service quality. The individual values ​​of the indicators are combined into an index value that serves as a measure of success.

Criticism of the ARCHSECRET model

There are various criticisms of the type of measurement. There may be misinterpretations due to the difference between expected and fulfilled service quality. Based on the difference, no conclusions can be drawn about the importance of the indicator for the customer. The measurement of service quality is therefore not clear.

In addition, the respondents did not ask for an “this is how it should be” expectation, which is why there are no precise starting points for what could be improved, i. H. controllability is not guaranteed.

However, it should be mentioned that the ARCHSECRET model is a very good measurement method for the service quality of NPOs in the social welfare segment, as the model was developed on the basis of a study in this area. From this it follows that the newly developed dimensions are indeed sector-specific, but already too special to use the model universally for all non-profit organizations. In addition, the dimensions adopted from the SERVQUAL model do not provide any new information.

Despite all the criticism, the model is very meaningful due to the practice-oriented study, and thus a good decision-making aid for those responsible for non-profit organizations in the social welfare sector.

Comparison of the ARCHSECRET model and the SERVQUAL model

Since the ARCHSECRET model uses the SERVQUAL model as a basis, they are similar in terms of the measurement method and the evaluation of the measurement. In the following it will be shown how the ARCHSECRET model differs from the SERVQUAL model.

The SERVQUAL model is often criticized because, despite its empirical foundation, it is too unspecific to be applied to all sectors. The dimensions of the ARCHSECRET model include some SERVQUAL-oriented dimensions, such as tangibles, reliability, responsiveness, competence, security and communication. But the ARCHSECRET model has been expanded to include the 4 non-profit-specific dimensions and thus tailored to this sector. These dimensions include humanness, enabling / empowerment, access and equity. This expansion by sector-specific dimensions makes the ARCHSECRET model superior to the SERVQUAL model. For non-profit organizations, the ARCHSECRET model is the most commonly used method to determine the quality of their service.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Manfred Bruhn: Quality Management for Nonprofit Organizations; Basics - planning - implementation - control . Springer Gabler, Wiesbaden 2013, ISBN 978-3-658-00353-1 , p. 65 .
  2. ↑ a b c d e f g h Elisabeth Vaughan, Edward Shiu: ARCHSECRET: A multi-item scale to measure service quality within the voluntary sector . In: International Journal of Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Marketing . Volume 6, No. 2 , November 16, 2000, p. 131-144 .
  3. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v Manfred Bruhn: Quality Management for Nonprofit Organizations; Basics - planning - implementation - control . Springer Gabler Verlag, Wiesbaden 2013, ISBN 978-3-658-00353-1 , p. 72-74 .
  4. ^ A b Hendrik Haas: Service quality from the customer's point of view; an empirical and theoretical study of the benefits of certificates according to DIN EN ISO 9000 ff. for consumers . In: Contributions to behavioral research . No. 36 . Duncker & Humblot, Hohenheim / Berlin 1998, ISBN 3-428-09525-1 , pp. 136 .
  5. ^ A b c Manfred Bruhn: Quality management for services; Manual for a successful quality management; Basics - Concepts - Methods . 10th edition. Springer Gabler, Berlin / Heidelberg 2016, ISBN 978-3-662-50359-1 , p. 157 .
  6. ↑ Ingo Forest Hart: quality management and quality control in public administration . Thesis. Mittweida September 21, 2014, p. 42 .
  7. ^ A b Manfred Bruhn: Quality management for services; Manual for successful quality management Basics - Concepts - Methods . 10th edition. Springer Gabler, Berlin / Heidelberg 2016, ISBN 978-3-662-50359-1 , p. 157 .
  8. ↑ Dominique Moisl: The action relevance matrix as a building block for the control and development-oriented evaluation of social services . In: Journal for Evaluation . tape 10 , no. 1 . Waxmann Verlag, Münster 2011, p. 74 f .
  9. ^ Heribert Meffert, Manfred Bruhn, Karsten Hadwich: Service Marketing ; Basics, concept, methods . 9th edition. Springer Gabler Verlag, Wiesbaden 2018, ISBN 978-3-658-19176-4 , pp. 213 .
  10. ↑ Sebastian Christian Keßel: loyalty competition in patient care; Perceived service quality as a determinant of patient loyalty . Springer Gabler Verlag, Wiesbaden 2015, ISBN 978-3-658-05602-5 , p. 69-70 .
  11. ^ Elisabeth Vaughan, Helen Woodruffe-Burton: The disabled student experience: does the SERVQUAL scale measure up? In: Quality Assurance in Education . Volume 17, No. 1 , February 1, 2011, ISSN  0968-4883 , p. 28-49 .
  12. ^ Sven Reinecke, Torsten Tomczak : Marketing Controlling Manual; Effectiveness and efficiency of a market-oriented company management . 2nd Edition. Springer Gabler Verlag, Wiesbaden 2006, ISBN 3-409-14286-X , p. 946-948 .