The Strategic Importance of Service Culture in the Development of Business Proce
I recently went back to the major paper I completed as part of my MBA at the University of Guelph. The paper is now nearly ten years old, but what drew me to the topic in the first place still resonates when I experience examples of how firms still don't seem to get it when it comes to service. Those moments when you shake your head at how an organization transacts with you, the moments when you realize that what you're experiencing really provides no benefit to you as a customer, but does more so for the service provider at your expense, are moments when you feel value is compromised.
We've all experienced it. It happens when you expect the hassle-free transaction and get sucked into a myriad of time consuming consequences, which are ultimately meant to satisfy some internal policy, procedure or process that makes it easier or less complicated for someone or some department on the other side of the counter. It's not that internal policies, procedures or processes aren't needed or that they're not important, it's just that often there is a misalignment of these operational aspects with the intended service culture and the needs of the consumer as an end-user.
In the past year, I had ordered an item online for delivery. It was a time sensitive transaction for me. When the package arrived at the office, the delivery was rejected, despite the fact the address was clearly marked and registered. In investigating what went wrong, I was told that because our firm's name was not listed on the building directory, it was rejected and returned to the central logistics depot where I could pick it up. Our firm's name was in fact on the building directory, and this was clearly a driver error, but as a consequence, I had to drive to the depot and pick the package up in order to get it on time. What followed was an even worse experience, when after arriving at the depot, I waited close to 45 minutes while the package was retrieved and brought out to the counter. Time is the most precious commodity there is, and in this instance the logistics firm's focus on efficiency and saving time in its delivery framework meant that the slightest human error only served to cost me, the customer; saving a few seconds on their end cost me hours on mine.
You can also experience this misalignment when the service provider is set-up from the outset with an operating model that is defined by the firm and not its customers. The best example of this is generally found in the hours of operation of any business. Recently, I wanted to take my vehicle for service and in attempting to book an appointment at the dealership, I found that the service hours still had not changed to allow for expanded evening, Saturday or Sunday service. When I last spoke with someone at the dealership looking for a time that would suit my lifestyle, I was told that evenings and weekends were the most popular timeframes for service, with very high demand, so it was difficult to get an appointment. The service department's opportunity was quite clear and as defined by its customer base. Yet, the hours for service to this day remain 7:30am to 6:00pm Monday to Friday, and Saturdays 8:00am to 1:00pm.
Customers today are extremely value conscious when it comes to pricing and companies are feverishly searching for that last scrap of incremental margin. The gap is closing with a pinch from both ends and it is the firms who are able to innovate best that are generally most successful. In the 1990’s, total quality management (TQM) and business process re-engineering (BPR) were popular management initiatives that focused primarily on improving business processes to affect improved product and service quality. Today, many firms are going back there as they seek to add value on both sides of the equation, often leveraging new technology. Understanding that business process is often not aligned with specific customer needs and expectations, but rather with the operational or functional requirements of management is an important lesson for those firms which truly want to make a difference.
The customer defines the problem and seeks solutions. Ideally then, you would think that the customer’s needs should remain the focus when considering development of or improvement to processes that impact the product and service mix. Far too often though, companies lose perspective on the needs of their customers because they become too distant from them. I've tried to get out to our properties as much as I can, and when I do I always approach it from the perspective that I am living there in the moment. What do I see as a customer? Would I be satisfied with what I see or experience? Could I live here? They are simple questions, and often placing yourself in your customer's shoes and asking these types of questions or trying to transact with yourself within your existing environment will tell you a great deal about how successful you really are and how much value you are really providing.
Listening to your customer is also critical. However, today's customer service centres are often used more for risk management and service recovery than they are as a conduit to the customer that provides a true representation of what went wrong with a view not only to recovery, but ultimately to improvement. We recently completed our annual Resident satisfaction survey to determine how well we have done at meeting their needs. The survey provided for quantitative and qualitative assessments of both our product and service and, as it has always done, it gave us great insight into not only what our customers felt was most important to them, but also how well we were doing in that regard. With a few years of these surveys behind us, we have also been able to benchmark and look for opportunities for continuous improvement. The data and information is great, but it is useless unless we actually do something with it and make a difference.
At the root of all this is a genuine caring for the customer that is rare these days. Putting yourself in your customers' shoes or really listening to what they have to say is important, but after the learning, taking action is even more so. Having a plan is one thing, but implementing that plan for the ultimate benefit of your customer is another because it takes conviction, perseverance and integrity to affect that kind of change. It's also so much easier to do if the collection of beliefs, expectations, and values learned and shared by a firm’s members and transmitted from one generation of employees to another is founded in a genuine caring for the customer that is at the heart of real service culture.
If you are looking to improve your operation in 2018, start with an understanding of your corporate culture, taken in the context of your customer's expectations, not just now but as far into the future as your view allows. Does your culture reflect a genuine caring for the customer? If it does, or if you really want it to, take the next step and evaluate what you do, not on your terms, but on those imposed by the people who expect value from the purchase of your product and service.
© 2018, WAYNE TUCK
