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Methods used for Gathering the VOC

To gather the VOC, effective methods for accurately capturing customer requirements are required. Several methods are available to capture the VOC.

• Interviews are used to gather information from stakeholders by talking to them directly. Interviews aid in identifying and defining features and functions or desired project deliverables.
• Focus groups is a trained moderator-guided interactive discussion that includes pre-qualified stakeholders and subject-matter experts (SMEs) to elicit their expectations and attitudes toward the proposed product, service, or result of the project.
• Facilitated workshops is an interactive group-focused sessions that bring together key cross-functional stakeholders to define the project or product requirements. It is a primary technique to define cross-functional requirements and reconcile stakeholder differences to the project. Facilitated workshops occur much faster than individual discussions.
• Questionnaires and surveys is another method where written sets of questions designed to quickly gather information from a broad audience.
• Mystery shopping commonly performed in retail industries. This method is used to measure the quality of a service by gathering specific information about the product or service. This method is performed by mystery shoppers who introduce themselves as customers and perform specific customer-related tasks, such as purchasing a product and raising questions and complaints about the product.
• Observations are a direct way of viewing individuals in their work environment or while using the product to identify the project or product requirements. Also referred to as job shadowing.
• Market research is an organized effort to gather information about the current trends in an industry and also Field reports is a formal report documented by field engineers or other on-site personnel who gather required information about events that occur during their field work.
• Customer feedback and complaints data are used to gather customer requirements. This method also involves gathering customer feedback about the quality of a product or service. The consolidated list of feedback from customers is referred to as complaints data.
• Reliability data is a source of information that helps in analyzing the reliability of a product or process. By gathering this data, you can plan strategies to gain a reputation with customers as a reliable provider of services.
• Staff feedback is another method of gathering opinions from staff who interact with customers directly or who possess knowledge about customers and their expectations. This information is captured by conducting surveys, brainstorming sessions, and other information gathering sessions.