Well, it still does – but maybe next time you’re turning socks and pairing them, you’ll think of this! The question then: Is your thinking inside out (predominantly using your internal colleague views to drive priorities?)
In a fast-changing business environment we need to think more broadly. We don’t ignore the internal perspective, but we need to align it with the external. I’ll give some tips as to how.
Will customers ever be happy?
53 percent state that business focus on CX has increased since the crisis started.
The business landscape has changed and so too should your strategy to improve revenues in the most efficient way. In a recent Ipsos Mori survey, over half of respondents believe that the focus on CX has increased. Interestingly, 79 percent think changing customer behaviour will stick.
With this in mind, think about People Experience. Something we talk about a lot at Custerian. It is the views of all People that matter as part of the change process – colleagues, customers, suppliers – all stakeholders views are important.
Less talking and more action?
I’d say it’s about having the right conversations to guide the right action. Be focussed. There are many ways to do this with stakeholders. Just think about who talks to all your stakeholders, how & when and use these conversations to find out more or if you want to move quickly, get a partner to help.
We spend time within every engagement talking to all stakeholders. We use our copyright alignment tool and 4P framework to do this so that we are gaining views across everything that impacts on how you deliver your product or service to customers so that we can recommend the right actions and quickly.
I’d like a 4Ps please (Bob! – For blockbuster fans only)
By looking at:
- People – they need to understand the purpose and how they can contribute in a way that allows them to feel good.
- Proposition – why should people deal with you rather than another organisation?
- Process – do you work as efficiently and effectively as possible to deliver what you do best to your customers?
- Priorities – do you relentlessly focus on creating a great experience and making it easy for customers to deal with you?
You can align what you do best with what customers want most and marry the internal with the external. Here’s a diagram i’ve drawn up to illustrate:
On the left if we assume People to be colleagues predominantly, we get the internal view of how people use processes to deliver the business outcomes (or service / product). Importantly colleagues must also understand your business purpose and what you do best in order to translate this to customers.
On the right, customers decide why to buy from you instead of someone else and we consider how easy we make it for them to deal with us. Talking to customers and getting their views on what is great and what needs to improve will help define your priorities.
Journey mapping can be a good tool to use to bring both sides together, but whatever the approach, do not focus on your process – look at what you do through the eyes of the customer!
Top down or bottom up?
In the diagram I also show the influence in a business (well most of them) and how this needs to shift to get the right customer focus. Directors have a huge influence on the activity that you undertake but remember that they are the furthest from the customer and even further from prospects.
This where doing ‘with’ not ‘to’ is important. Work with colleagues to better understand customers (and what they are asking for) and they will engage and deliver your purpose in a far better way – more efficiently and effectively than ever before.
This is where most change can go wrong – but that’s for another blog!
Are we nearly there yet?
We actually are and hopefully this airline will help you to remember (incidentally their people are key to their brand!):
Know all your people and their wants
Look at your P’s
Map out your journeys
You can then work out where the problems and therefore priorities are and get moving.
Beverley Stag is a Judge at the UK Customer Experience Awards 2020.