Those of us who spend time in and around Customer Service organizations see our fair share of big investments—new IT deployments, reengineering of back-office processes, upgrading our contact centers … the list goes on. With the introduction of each new Customer Experience (Cx) program, the size of the investment portfolio grows even further through projects like enterprise-wide journey mapping, training initiatives, new service channels, and improvements to research and data analytics platforms. Big projects are a reality for CCO’s and their leadership teams, and justifiably so. Maintaining customer support infrastructure is undoubtedly key to our long-term success.

But are we putting too much emphasis on our customer infrastructure at the expense of the smaller and more actionable practices that could generate more immediate results?

When Smaller is Better…

When asked to describe their Customer Experience initiatives, many CCO’s point to the “small stuff” as being key to the results they’ve achieved. In a world where everyone talks about “Big”—big data, big projects, big commitments—it’s these small, seemingly insignificant, practices, with not-so-small impacts, that are becoming the poster children of their efforts.

I’m talking about practices that don’t require an “act of congress” to implement—the ones that are just good common sense and take next to nothing to implement, except a little foresight and follow-through. Simple and easy, yet, still, an overwhelming number of organizations focus on the big solution being implemented and, in doing so, miss the opportunities to make a difference today.

Consider call/contact centers for a moment, where “big stuff” always takes center stage. How often do we hear “When our new CIS is in place,” “As soon as we implement speech analytics,” “Once we get that new IVR,” etc. But the reality is that most of what we need to make incremental—and sometimes big—changes is already there for those with the creative energy to act on it.

Fix-it-Fridays

A past client (We’ll call her Sarah), one I still regard as a brilliant Customer Service manager, was excellent at demonstrating this concept, i.e., using what she had available at her disposal today, combined with a real action bias to catalyze big change. One of my favorites was a practice she called “Fix-it Fridays.”

During the week, she would mine a few recorded calls for good examples of customer interactions that were “less than optimally handled.” This could mean the rep simply misunderstood the customer’s issue and employed an ineffective solution, or that a good solution was just poorly delivered and/or executed.

Each Friday afternoon, she would get small groups of reps together (voluntarily, but usually enticed with a bit of free food or cake) to brainstorm better ways of handling these customer situations. They would listen to a sample call together and discuss how the rep handled the interaction. Then they (not the supervisor, QA manager, or trainer, but the front line reps themselves) would talk about how they would approach the call differently. Challenge and debate were encouraged. But it was also a safe and rewarding experience that left everyone, including the rep in the “case study,” feeling better equipped to deliver on their Cx commitment. As this manager used to say, “it’s a little like looking in the mirror when you apply your own service standards to the responses we deliver day in and day out.”

Many organizations use some variation of this in their centers. Nearly everyone has a QA/monitoring process in place (although many place their focus on procedural and policy compliance rather than emerging Cx values and standards). Most have decent follow-up mechanisms for supervisor coaching when problems occur. And (most of the time) when broad themes emerge, they work them into their ongoing training.  But all of this takes time. And, increasingly, such efforts rely on technology and infrastructure to mine interactions, which often means more time and complexity.

Sarah’s approach was focused on “time to market.” It didn’t discount the value of the existing process or the opportunities new technology can offer. Rather, it simply looked for ways to act more quickly. Perhaps, more importantly, she used her weekly forums as a way to teach staff how their Cx standards really were being applied, by immersing them directly, and by letting the team explore those standards in real time. The focus wasn’t on developing new policies or approving new scripts. It was about learning and applying good Cx.

Your reaction to this may be that you achieve these results through your QA process and ongoing coaching. But before your discount Sarah’s practice as run-of-the-mill, ask yourself:

• How long does it take employees in your organization to act on a solution once it’s identified?
• Do you encourage bad practices to be changed on the spot, sometimes on the basis of good instinct or common sense, or do all changes have to go through your business improvement processes and protocols?
• Once a new approach is identified, how quickly is it shared and institutionalized?
• Do your managers and staff feel empowered to take risks and deploy changes quickly?
• Are small “experiments” allowed, knowing that most can be “unwound” if they prove to be less effective than anticipated?

Examples like this abound throughout our customer service organizations—process fixes,touchpoint improvements, intelligence gathering techniques, and many more. And there is no doubt that the projects and initiatives we have in place to deal with these challenges will lead us to a more consistent and sustainable application of our Cx strategy. But without an equally ambitious focus on the smaller solutions, and a bias from the organization to support them, they simply won’t happen.

Commit today to making the small stuff an equal priority within your company. Ask for it, reward it, and manage to it. The wins may seem small at first, but stack up enough of them and you’ll discover stronger momentum and a faster ROI on your Cx investment.

 To learn more about Cx Solutions available through onVector, including:

• Cx Readiness Assessments
• Cx Program Startups
• Cx Alignment & Standards Development
• Rapid Touchpoint Renewal
• Cx Management & Governance Solutions

visit us at http://onvectorconsulting.com/cxsolutions

Over the past 24 months, Customer Experience Initiatives (Cx programs, as they have come to be called) have climbed to the top of the radar screens of most leadership teams. Organizations are abuzz with projects to identify “touchpoints,” map “customer journeys,” and strengthen their customer-facing business processes. Alongside these initiatives are even larger investments in acquiring the data and analytics required to feed and sustain these service improvement strategies.

Big Promises/ Bold Expectations:

Like many other large corporate initiatives that compete for resources and executive mind-space, the Cx mantra was a big one, and came with a bold promise. It would change the way we think about customers. It would drive institutional awareness of what moves customer perception and behavior. And it would establish and institutionalize practices for continuous improvement across all our touchpoints and service delivery channels. In essence, it would transform our business into a customer-centric enterprise, ostensibly bringing with it increased customer satisfaction, loyalty, sales, and, ultimately, ROI.

Judging by the size of these investments (easily in the high six figures incrementally per annum for a maturing Cx program), leadership and company boards are expecting payoffs that are as big and bold as the promises initially made by their CCO’s and Marketing Executives. As programs mature, many leadership teams and boards are asking (or re-asking) some basic, yet seemingly tough-to-answer, questions:

• What does success look like when our Cx Program matures?
• How will we measure progress toward our Cx “end-game ?
• How fast can we expect to start seeing results?
• When will we “ring the cash register” with real ROI for the business? (i.e. how will gains in satisfaction and loyalty translate into tangible benefits to the business such (customer retention, sales, profits, growth, etc.)

The Case for Better Cx Governance:

 Ideally, many of these questions would have been answered (at least in part) before the initial ramp-up of their company’s Cx investments—enough so that we’d at least be seeing some regular tracking of progress metrics (beyond basic activity tracking and monthly project updates), and we’d know with some clarity which strategies were working and which ones needed course corrections to keep our ROI projections on track. But for many companies, even those with “mature” Cx initiatives in place, the answers to these questions are often shallow and lack the specificity and rigor that the size of these investments should command. And in some cases, there is no answer—just the sound of, well, … crickets.

As intuitive as it may be to continue investing in Cx (after all, who wouldn’t invest in better customer service?), the absence of good answers to the above questions, and the lack of credible results and measurable successes create doubt in the future of these programs. And the risk of Cx being just another passing fad (think reengineering, six sigma, Lean, and the myriad of other buzz-word programs that were sent to an early grave) looms large. Unfortunate, given the momentum so many of us have generated through our early investments in Cx renewal.

What we’re really talking about here is a lack of basic governance. The number of Cx programs that possess the types of measures and tracking systems necessary to efficiently manage and deliver on their Cx commitments is far less than the number of new Cx investments and initiatives that are announced everyday by companies across the globe. That’s the bad news.

The good news is that effective Cx governance is neither costly nor necessarily complicated to put in place, particularly when compared with the size and magnitude of what companies have spent to date on their Cx program in the form of customer surveys, focus groups, touchpoint and journey mapping exercises, and “big data” analytics. But it does require that you make it a focus and priority of your Cx program, and assign to it an importance commensurate with all its other critical activities.

Defining Your Line of Sight…

In our view, good Cx governance, at its most basic, is about establishing a clear “Line of Sight” between your strategy and the desired outcomes of your program, with clear linkages to all the moving parts and initiatives that comprise it. This involves clearly defining strategy and desired outcomes, aligning stakeholders, defining accountabilities, and establishing internal commitments. It involves putting in place a process that translates your goals, values and standards into an efficient and repeatable process for assessing and renewing your customer channels and touchpoints. And, most importantly, it includes closed-loop reporting and monitoring to manage the pipeline of ongoing improvements that emerge, and ultimately lock in the expected benefits and ROI. Establishing that kind of seamless, end-to-end management structure for your Cx program requires that you spend some quality time on each of these areas, and the integration points between them. The most important of these are:

• Defining (holistically) what success looks like when your Cx program hits its stride. This often means stepping back and taking a much broader view of what success implies. The answer goes far beyond commonly used satisfaction indicators or even Net Promoter Scores. For example, good Cx programs can have enormous impact on organization efficiencies and cost savings (ironic since cost savings and satisfaction have conventionally been viewed as tradeoffs). Done right, Cx can, and often does, lead to fewer service interactions, channel transfers, and process rework. In retrospect, these benefits should have been part of any good Cx value case in the first place. But if they weren’t, declaring them soon is vital.
• Create measureable goals (even if they are not your final ones)- Companies often bypass this step because they feel they don’t have enough data, intelligence, or history to establish a good target, so they opt instead for goals like “improve x” or “reduce y” without assigning a quantifiable target to it. But the reality is that some of the most successful initiatives STARTED with leadership making a bold declaration of the ambition in quantifiable terms, and setting a clear stake in the ground, long before the program or initiative was fully mature. For example, Six Sigma programs do this by their very nature (the actual quality level implied by the name). Lean programs use bold, and often radical savings goals and standards to actually catalyze projects and keep them focused on the right magnitude of aspiration. An aggressive and measureable goal that is adjusted based on what you learn during execution will always yield more than a goal that is left unquantified.
• Map the connections and interplay between your goals and your program’s initiatives. No improvement initiative should begin without knowing which of your goals and targets it is attached to. For example, many companies have initiatives in place to reduce call wait time and track progress toward that end. Best practice companies on the other hand draw clear connections between these kinds of improvements and the higher order goals of their service improvement strategies. One of my clients, for example, spent considerable time analyzing and correlating their wait time initiative to one of their board level satisfaction metrics. By doing this, they were able to determine that a 1 second reduction in wait time translated directly to a .004% improvement in overall satisfaction. As a result, those focused on the initiative now had a clear window into what success looked like and how it would cascade up the value chain. Equally important was the clarity it provided to the organization’s leadership. Executives now had a window into how all those seemingly random initiatives translated into things they were directly accountable for and cared deeply about, and had no problem investing accordingly.
• Monitor and manage your “pipeline” of improvements – One of the characteristics of a mature Cx program is a healthy “pipeline” of small and well-focused initiatives delivering ongoing improvements to customer touchpoints and delivery channels. This is similar in some respects to Six Sigma and Lean programs that are set up deliberately to spawn hundreds of continuous improvement projects, each of which are closely monitored against their own specific value case, as well as their contribution to the enterprise goal. That’s what makes programs like these successful- creating wins and making them repeatable. Cx is no different. The real measure of a Cx program’s success has less to do with those large infrastructure and systems investments, and much more to do with the capacity of the organization to spawn continuous improvement and repeatable success. Developing and maintaining the processes to fuel and manage that pipeline is a critical part of Cx Governance.
• Closed loop reporting – Most of the work you do in the above areas will go for naught unless you establish some ongoing reporting of progress at both the program and activity levels. The number of reports, content and frequency of distribution will be unique to the needs of your program. What’s important is that reporting against your goals and standards occur on a regular basis and with a high degree of transparency. For Cx to be truly embedded within the culture of your business, the individuals and stakeholders driving these improvements at the “work-face” need to see how they impact the ultimate success measures of your Cx program. Making individual improvement successes visible and aligned with the standards and values you’ve set can go a long way toward reinforcing the kind of culture you want working in your business.

Of course, good Cx governance also requires that the processes and oversight needed to execute the above requirements be in place with accountabilities clearly defined. This doesn’t have to be a huge staff function, and ideally it shouldn’t be. But it should be a declared accountability in the business, responsible for ensuring that all of the components of your line-of-sight framework are in place and being managed. That function can also provide the oversight needed for your ongoing program, and will often work through the leadership team (via steering teams, councils, or other vehicles) to reinforce and oversee progress and manage the ROI of the program.

If the above recipe for Cx governance feels a bit like motherhood and apple pie, it’s probably because to a large extent it is. In many respects, it’s “Management 101” and should be applied to any major initiative or program within a commercial enterprise, and at the enterprise level itself. Unfortunately, as new project investments and priorities ebb and flow across the business, the importance of this basic management practice is often pushed aside in lieu of the firefights and priorities of the day.

Today, many Cx programs, especially those in early stages of evolution are at risk- not because of what they are doing, but because of what they are NOT DOING. By not focusing equally on the governance processes and activities required to manage and sustain their Cx investments, they risk unwinding much of the momentum they’ve created and are ultimately putting the future of their program in jeopardy. Don’t let that occur in your Cx program. The strongest Cx programs are those that make governance a top priority, and yours should too. Start today by asking the tough questions that many of your executives and board members are already asking …

• What does success look like?
• How will we measure our progress?
• When we be able to demonstrate initial success?
• How and when will all this translate into tangible ROI for the Business?

Let the answers to these questions be a catalyst for developing and guiding the development of YOUR Cx governance framework.

Over the past 24 months, Customer Experience Initiatives (Cx programs, as they have come to be called) have climbed to the top of the radar screens of most leadership teams. Organizations are abuzz with projects to identify “touchpoints,” map “customer journeys,” and strengthen their customer-facing business processes. Alongside these initiatives are even larger investments in acquiring the data and analytics required to feed and sustain these service improvement strategies. >>Next>>

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Customer touchpoints  have always been the ground zero where Cx battles are won and lost. For years, even long before the Cx “movement” made the term touchpoint a part of the corporate lexicon, Customer Service organizations have been obsessed with improving these targeted areas where our customers transact business with us.

And for years, we’ve invested enormous sums of money trying to measure, analyze, and improve our customer touchpoints.  Customer research, satisfaction surveys, training programs, systems investments, process improvements, and the myriad of other “projects” we take on in our annual business plans are in large measure focused on what we believe are our most important customer interactions. And today, they are the central focus of our new Cx initiatives, whether it’s the mapping of customer journeys within and across these interactions, or the creation of new products, channels and communication strategies to enhance those experiences.

Yet ironically, with as much focus as we’ve placed on the proverbial “touchpoint” over the years, and with as much consensus as there is on how to improve them, there still exists little universal alignment across the Cx community at large on what exactly a touchpoint is. And without that, one can only hope we are spending our resources on improving the right things that will yield the right kind of outcomes.

Lack of Definition = Lack of Focus

When I start working with a new organization, I always try to get a read on where their current focus is, and how they see their priorities moving forward. I start by asking  some general questions about past customer service performance, existing satisfaction levels and what they see on the horizon in terms of emerging focus. And yes, I often raise the question of “touchpoints” — Which ones are working? Which ones are not? Which ones are most vulnerable?

These are, of course not “pass/fail” questions. I ask them primarily to help me understand  the lens they are currently looking through, which in turn helps establish a bit of a baseline. Their answers invariably span a broad range of different perspectives and interpretations on what they believe their touchpoints are and where they want to start improving.

Some clients will talk about improving touchpoints in terms of delivery channels –– call centers, storefronts, etc. Others speak in terms of the transactions themselves — paying a bill, signing up for service, getting information on a service interruption. Others say its about a certain type of customer — For example, candidates for product renewal or upgrade, or what they might term their “at risk” customers. And for some, touchpoint improvement is viewed from an extremely broad/functional perspective, like improving  “customer billing” or “call centers” — based on recent (albeit sometimes very “general”) customer feedback.

Of course, they are all right. And, at the same time there exist flaws in each of these interpretations.

Rather than thinking about touchpoints as specific transactions, channels, and customer types; perhaps we ought to think about these in combination — That is, three separate but strongly related parts of a customer interaction:

The Transaction:

We call this the “WHAT,”  or the purpose of the interaction. For example, paying a bill is a transaction. Receiving a bill is also a transaction, but of a very different type with a ton of different issues at play. Getting status on an outage is an interaction. Initiating service and setting up a new account is an interaction. There are literally hundreds of transaction types that involve thousands if not millions of customer interactions every day. But while a transaction does represent the “what” of the interaction, it often ignores “where” the transaction is occurring as well as the customer “setting” within which it is taking place. Without those, real customer centric improvement is difficult if not impossible.

The Channel:

Channels represent “WHERE” transactions occur. These can be inside the company or outside. They can be automated or manual. They can be company triggered or customer triggered. In essence, they represent the “medium” through which the transaction occurs. Call centers, websites, mobile applications, etc. are all channels. But while a channel represents “where” the customer is conducting business with you, it too is not by itself a touchpoint. Focusing your renewal efforts on channels alone can lead to useful improvements (often of the operational or efficiency variety), but they also tend to lead to more “one size” fits all solutions.

The Context:

The third aspect of a touchpoint is the “CONTEXT”.  For us, this is really a combination of a segment, persona and a circumstance. In our view, it’s the most important part of the touchpoint equation, as it reflects the true setting the customer is in when they begin the journey. As one of my clients likes to say, context “puts a face on the interaction”. For example, a “high income (and often “overextended”) customer calling to obtain a payment arrangement after losing their job” is an example of a context. Contexts exist at varying levels of granularity, and undoubtedly require a bit more sophistication to accurately define and portray. But the closer you can get to weaving the context into your definition of a touchpoint, the closer you will be to focusing on change that will produce a relevant, meaningful and high quality experience.

Of course, this is just our take on it. Based on our own experiences and lessons learned, we’ve found this to be the lens that most quickly focuses us on the right changes and provides the fastest path to successful touchpoint renewal.

However, the fact is, you can take any one of these paths in isolation and ultimately get to the point of making useful and lasting improvements. It just that this less integrated approach often requires more time and iterations to reveal solutions that are genuinely oriented around the  true needs and drivers of the customer.

Alternatively, defining a touchpoint as a combination of purpose (transaction), channel, AND context will produce touchpoint improvements that are, from the start, highly focused on customer centric-design. Organizations are less likely to get bogged down or sidetracked on things that are only peripheral to the customers’ line of sight. If the objective of your Cx initiative is to be truly customer-centric, and to get your organization to embody change at that level, we think you are better off starting with a more integrated view of your touchpoint landscape. Cycle times to implementation will be shorter, and you will begin amassing a string of “quick wins” which we all know is key to building momentum and transforming the thinking and culture of the organization.

Bob Champagne is Managing Partner: Customer Experience Solutions at onVector Consulting Group.. Bob has over 25 years of  experience in Cx and Customer Operations, with emphasis on the global energy and utilities sector. Bob has consulted with hundreds of companies across numerous industries and geographies. Bob can be contacted at bob.champagne@onvectorconsulting.com or through LinkedIn at http://www.linkedin.com/in/bobchampagne 

CxTAM Industry View
Copyright 2013, onVector Consulting

At its core, Cx is about all the pursuit of delivering  an exceptional customer experience across every touchpoint, every time.

That’s a pretty ambitious goal, and one that I’ve begun to refer to with my clients as the “Cx Holy Grail”.

EVERY touchpoint, EVERY time? Think about it. Every time we buy a product, activate a product, use a product, get support, renew our service, suspend or terminate our contract…and the list goes on…, we must deliver an exceptional experience. Some would even say that our viewing of advertisements, interactions with social media, and even our passive conversations with others about our experiences qualify as a touch points that need to be “managed”.  And they wouldn’t be far off.

So where do we focus first? Which touch points? Which parts of those touch points ? What can wait? What can’t?

One way to simplify the madness is to have a common set of unifying standards that every part of the organization can identify with, routinely. While statements like “Exceptional Cx: Every Touchpoint, Every Time” make for good mantras and vision statements, our Cx program will be short lived unless those statements can be  translated into a clear set of observable, measurable and actionable factors. Without these, you’re literally flying blind with no way of knowing when something is broken, where improvement is needed, or how to fix it. That’s a core principle in managing any strategy, and one that is glaringly missing from most Cx programs today. Our Touchpoint Assessment Model (TAM), and the 12 attributes that comprise it, was essentially constructed to address that gap and and help our clients better focus and navigate their Cx improvements.

TAM in a Nutshell

While  the model is based on a quite a bit of research, client experiences, and some pretty creative crowdsourcing; its structure and architecture is quite simple: 3 key areas of focus comprised of 12 unique and discernible attributes.

The collapse of a conventional service model, and the rise of a new one…

One of the exciting things about my line of work is that we see lots of new ideas and ways of doing business. Not all of them make sense at the time. Some just have to evolve. But over time, we witness step changes where bleeding edge becomes leading edge. And what causes that to occur is that a brand new “use case” emerges for a solution or technology that has been waiting for its time.

Silence in the dark…

During hurricane Sandy, many of us in the northeast were starved for information. Millions of customers were without power, gas stations were out of service, grocery stores were closed, and just about every part of life as we knew it shut down. For many, it was a “mini Katrina,” making us reflect on what life must have been like in New Orleans in 2005. For others, it was the real thing.

It’s hard to get real upset about things when you look at them through such a lens. In large measure, folks affected by Hurricane Sandy were pretty patient, at least in the early going. But over time, that patience waned and the demand for information escalated—information that never really materialized. For the most part, customers understood they weren’t going to get specifics, but they wanted something. What they got was nothing.

The sum total of the narrative was:

• “This is an unprecedented event”
• “It’s not our fault”
• “We’re all doing the best we can”
• “It will be a minimum of 7-10 days before things return to normal”

On day one, that may have been an appropriate response (or at least somewhat understandable), but with each additional day, that response created more and more frustration.

A core competency becomes irrelevant…

Ironically, Utility companies pride themselves on service excellence, and for the most part do a fairly good job of it. Most have made dramatic strides in terms of customer experience. Sure, there is a lot more they can do, but for the most part, the nature, speed, and quality of service have all improved. Most have invested significantly in upgrading core service and delivery channels (Call Center availability, CRM technology, metering and billing systems), and have expanded the range of service options (web, mobile, kiosks, etc.)

And as you might expect (since it is one of their biggest drivers of satisfaction), most have gotten better in terms of outage notification, communications, and restorations. Most major utilities have online outage maps available that provide location, current status, and restoration times. Infrastructure has gotten better with expanded use of distribution automation and switching technologies. The logistics of managing restoration efforts has improved. And customer communications (both proactive and reactive) have expanded. After all, it is (and should be)a core competency.

But eight weeks ago, none of this really mattered. Sandy was an unprecedented event. The foundation for most of the improvements referenced above was compromised by the storm. You can only provide information you have, and the damage assessments had only just begun. Even if you possess the technical and informational resources required to provide updated outage maps, doing so assumes that customers can get online to view them. Most outage notifications require a phone call. Most phones today are VOIP and require power to function. Ironically, the call centers were generally available and functional (the three times I called, the call was answered in less than twenty seconds), but with none of the other parts of the process working, the reps just became another “talking head” for what we already know (or didn’t know)—The storm was an unprecedented event. It was not their fault. They had no information. And it’s a waste of your (and by inference their) time to contact them for more information before 7-10 days had passed.

Electric power is an interesting kind of product. You don’t think about it much. In fact, studies have shown that the typical customer only thinks about their utility 6-9 minutes a year. You could say it’s like “air”—you only think about it when you can’t get it.  And when it’s unavailable, it certainly occupies a lot more of your mind-space. Most complaints and pockets of significant dissatisfaction can be directly ascribed to extended outage situations. And those impressions last a lifetime.

So while utilities have invested heavily in service improvements, one could argue that their systems have been designed for everything OTHER THAN that which poses the most significant risk to satisfaction and loyalty. But again, it’s a bit of a Catch-22. Designing a system for a low-probability but catastrophic event that most likely will render the system itself useless, seems somewhat circular and, ultimately, futile. Or does it?

Customers take matters in their own hands…

In circumstances like this, some customers intellectually understand the position the utility is in. They may not like it, but the more it becomes clear that they are asking for information the company simply doesn’t have and/or can’t provide, they will come to understand that continued efforts to obtain such information are pointless.

During the storm, many customers turned to online news, discussion boards, online forums, and social media for their information with varying degrees of success. What many wanted to know was whether work had begun in their area, whether the source of the problem had been identified, and a better (if not definitive) sense of restoration time. But

for the most part, they wanted to know that repairs in their area had been initiated. Or in some cases, THAT their power HAD been restored (Many were staying with relatives or friends out of town, and this would be their only way to learn that things were back up and running). Last year during a similar event, my wife learned we were restored via Facebook, two days before the utility reported it on the web.

 A solution staring you in the face?

But here’s where it gets interesting. During any such wide-scale outage, there are hundreds of thousands of eyeballs scouring these channels, many capable of providing information the utility doesn’t have access to—localized damage, poles down, safety issues, and plenty more. But the vast majority of this information goes unharvested.

In fact, with Sandy it was just the opposite. My local utility was literally pumping out messages, at times more than three or four per hour. But the sum total of the content was—yes, you guessed it… that it was an unprecedented event; it was not their fault; that they had no information; and, yes, that unnerving seven-to-ten-day restoration prediction. There was the occasional posting of “ice and water” locations (met with sarcasm since temps were often well below freezing). There were some attempts by customers to engage with whoever was providing these messages, but it was always met with some way of saying “we don’t know”.

Then I noticed something interesting. A few customers began hashtagging tweets with specific information about their location. Soon others were replying in kind—simple things like “we have two trucks on our a street.” Then someone else would chime in with an address that had been restored.

One of the utilities in our area (not ours, mind you) even attempted to “coordinate” some of the dialogue between customers—things like “thanks for your question about such-and-such a town, we don’t know the status, but three customers are reporting activity in your area.” That type of coordination was very rare to see, and was only short lived, but someone began to see an opportunity and was willing to act on it. For the most part, though, the majority of the dialog was between and among customers, and the utilities were largely absent from the conversation, save for the repeated banter of … “7-10 days.”

What if?…

OK—extrapolate with me a bit here…

What if the posts and tweets of customers were slightly more structured—like we saw with customers hash-tagging their locations?

What if utility reps played a role in facilitating the conversations between customers and other information providers and consumers?

What if we had systems that could synthesize large volumes of unstructured data that was already out there and actually add value to it?

What if utility workers and restoration crews could post directly to appropriate forums and boards as the work was being done?

In short, what if the customer was actually a participant in providing customer service?

Emerging Models…

Farfetched? Perhaps.
But there are models that are beginning to look exactly like this.

GifGaf , a UK mobile service provider has migrated almost completely to customer-provided customer service. No call centers, no lobbies, just a portal for customers to report issues and actually play a role in responding to and solving problems. There are reward mechanisms where customers can earn points toward minutes or other merchandise for contributing valuable content and solutions. The model isn’t perfect, and some customers would say it’s just another way to save money and push self-service, but if you look a bit more closely, you’ll see that this is a radically different approach.

There is a variety of services (see-click-fix, and get satisfaction) to name a few , that have begun to apply the concept of “crowdsourcing” (a more formal name for aggregating and extracting value from available streams of social content in the provision of services) to the provision of infrastructure and other utility services. In both cases, these companies provide a structured app for customers to report issues, and companies to respond, while tracking progress along the way—everything from fixing potholes to streetlights. Only these services are not completely tied to the company providing the service. It does, however, behoove the service provider to monitor and participate in the resolution process, since the complaints, issues, and resolution have so much visibility.

Take-aways…

I believe we are at an interesting juncture in customer service—one that can not only improve the process and costs of providing customer solutions, but radically change the delivery model.

To me, the take-aways are threefold:

1. Become a more active participant in your customer communities. Don’t just settle for perfunctory uses of Twitter and Facebook as communication channels. Engage in a value-adding way to the dialogue that is already taking place. Instead of trying to create new followers or get “Liked,” try to join in on active discussions and dialogue.
2. Change how we think about service infrastructure and technologies. I would say 90% of our systems are based on using information collected from customers by our companies FOR our companies. Instead, think about how we might harness information from the broad range of unstructured data already out there (information already provided by our customers FOR our customers) in the provision of better and more relevant customer experiences.
3. Focus on the one or two areas where dissatisfaction and loyalty are most at risk. Most companies design their service infrastructures for the average environment, when the larger risk is posed by the anomalous circumstance (the three-week outage, the blizzard that closes ten airports, etc.). That will likely change the tools, technologies and even the customer portals that are used for providing service, as well as who actually provides it.

Some could argue that engaging in this sort of thinking poses a significant competitive threat (by removing you from the process and giving competitors a window into your customer relationships). I would argue just the opposite—that customer communities exist all around us, and many of us are blind to the value it can provide in terms of better, cheaper, and more relevant service.

Instead of viewing it as a threat, look for ways to engage with it and add value.

-b

Not letting your goals get in the way of execution

Most professional athletes live their lives in pursuit of some pretty bold career goals–goals which they then translate into objectives for the upcoming season. If they’re really organized and efficient, they then manage to these goals in their daily preparation, execution, and ongoing improvement efforts.

In his post-round press conference, it was clear to anyone listening, that this guy has some pretty bold competitive goals for his career, and for the 2012 season. He knows how many “wins” he wants over the next several years, and you can bet, like most golfers, he pays attention to the numbers and performance statistics week in and week out. But at the same time, it was also clear that these goals, and his progress toward them, were not going to affect his approach to this one tournament. He’d prepared the best way he knew how, and on that Sunday, he would follow his gut and compete the way he does in any tournament.

Conversely, most weekend golfers, like myself, will react very differently when we notice a change in our execution. Think about the last time you double-bogeyed a hole you routinely par, or caused yourself heartache by missing a fairway or green in the exact spot you were trying to avoid. For most of us, and even some professionals, a mid-round “speed bump” will at best create a momentary panic, and a worst send the train completely off the rails. We begin reverting to “mechanical thoughts” and in the process of “screwing our head back on” to its proverbial shoulders, lose the focus on what, in the end, truly matters–that little white ball in that little round hole.

I thought a lot about this last week as I watched the back nine on Sunday afternoon. I noticed the distinct difference between some players’ demeanors (like Tiger and Sergio) versus those of Bubba and Louis. One by one, we saw each player’s bad shot or series of mis-hits take their toll and remove them from contention, while Bubba, in his typical unorthodox fashion, played his own game. Win or lose, he wasn’t going to change strategy or direction. Even when faced with the improbably deep shot into the right pinestraw, he stuck to the strategy that had landed him there.

The key message in all of this for me is that there is a time and place for planning and assessing, and a separate time and place for execution. Occasionally the two will overlap, but rarely do managing and executing co-exist nicely together, and when they do clash, it frequently causes bad results. Think of the customer service rep who gets so preoccupied with adhering to a script or striving to achieve an average call handle time that they completely lose sight of the customer’s issue. Or the manager who is so focused on meeting a reporting deadline that a serious operational problem identified by the data goes unnoticed.

In his press conference, there was a lot of talk about the unorthodoxy of Bubba’s swing. How he stood cool in the face of adversity. How his attitude looked more like that of a kid having fun than a professional golfer. All these questions were the media’s way of saying “Nice job focusing on your execution and sticking to your game” even in the midst of competitive pressure and a competitor who was so close to him in the final holes that his unorthodox strategy may have looked all the more improbable.

But just as he began to appear aloof and perhaps even a bit stubborn in his unorthodox approach to the game, he returned again to speaking about his goals–a key one of which is to achieve 10 wins on tour. And he is nearly halfway there at age 34.  His goals clearly guided his preparation and play, but his progress toward those goals was not about to distract his focus from the execution that was required. Not on that Sunday afternoon.

How often do we let our goals, strategies, and operating metrics distract and sometimes prevent us from executing the way that we do best?

-b

Bob Champagne is Managing Partner of onVector Consulting Group, a privately held international management consulting organization specializing in the design and deployment of Performance Management tools, systems, and solutions. Bob has over 25 years of Performance Management experience with primary emphasis on Customer Operations in the global energy and utilities sector. Bob has consulted with hundreds of companies across numerous industries and geographies. Bob can be contacted at bob.champagne@onvectorconsulting.com

Of all the business functions discussed in the arena of performance improvement over the years, Customer Service has certainly gotten its fair share. But lately, with the rapidly growing range of new enabling technologies, and an accelerated adoption rate that shows these technologies are starting to take root, we are now seeing some of the best performance “breakout” stories since the legendary FedEx, Nordstrom, and Toyota (Lexus) case studies of the 90’s.

What’s interesting about today’s success stories is that it’s no longer about what I call the customer “heroics”– the FEDEX guy who hires a plane to deliver a package that just “has to get there overnight”, or the Nordstrom sales clerk who agrees to sell a single shoe to a woman with only one leg. And it’s not about the technologies. It’s now about the little things–the refreshingly responsive, yet consistent, way in which everyday transactions get executed.

I’ve got your number

A few weeks ago I called Apple to check on a repair (self induced). I was in my car and didn’t have time to look up the number of the repair facility or the order number. I figured I could call Apple’s main number (which they apparently pre-program into your phone), and have them look me up via my email or phone number. If I was lucky, they’d transfer me directly to the repair facility.

I called the number, their system recognized mine, and without any IVR menus, speech requests, or human involvement, I heard “We recognize that you have a repair with us. It was completed yesterday and shipped at 5:23PM for Saturday delivery at your home address…If you need anything else, just say what you need.” Everyone these days has voice recognition and ANI capabilities in their call center. But in this experience, everything was placed exactly right, in the precise order required to produce a great experience

I had a similar experience last year with AT&T Mobile, when I received a text that read:

“Your bill is ready for $xxx.xx (which is my average bill amount). You can view it on ATT.com or by clicking here.—–Please respond “full” if you would like to pay in full, or a specific amount ‘XX.XX’ We will process your payment using the credit card on file”

Superman is still there- he's just not as conspicuous!

 These days, nearly every company I work with has a mobile strategy, or at least has one on the drawing board. But this is the best application of mobile service I’ve seen, again, largely because of how the process was designed and sequenced. Sure, I could go visit the website and see my bill, then go home and pay it like nearly every other system. Or I can simply respond “full.”

Of course, there is the Apple Store in your local mall that sells more per square foot than just about any retailer in your state. These stores are always packed, even at 1pm on a slow Wednesday. There are no cash registers. Cards are swiped by sales clerks using hand-held devices, which prompts someone in the back to quickly bring the product to you. They offer to print or email your receipt on the spot, and you’re off. I can remember distinctly the first time I experienced this, actually leaving the store feeling like I had forgotten something.

Truth is, I DID forget something– all the needless paper and annoyance that usually accompanies routine retail transactions!

So here’s the moral of those stories, and others like it—It’s no longer about the heroics. It’s no longer about the technologies. It’s about how well those things are understood in the complete context of customer experience drivers, and then deployed in a mass producible way.

Build in the “small stuff” where it matters most

Next time you are getting ready to deploy one of those myriad of “must have” or “way cool” technologies for the sake of customer satisfaction or productivity improvement, think about the following in terms of HOW and WHERE you will deploy it within your process:

• Will it help me produce a faster TTE (Time to Engagement)? –- That’s the time it takes from the customer’s initial call arriving until they actually feel that the agent or system understands and is engaged in solving the problem (rather than the incessant and often redundant asking/probing/clarifying about why the person is calling). How long does it take to get past all that script-based validation, authentication, menu choices, long-winded greetings, survey requests, transfers, redundant requests, etc.)?
• Will it improve the speed of the transaction? Will it mean more or fewer steps for the customer? This sounds simple, but in most applications of CS technology — IVR, ANI, Voice Recognition -– the pain factor for the customer usually goes up, even though cost for the company may be going down.
• Does it improve customer convenience? What I liked about the AT&T bill text experience is that the entire solution took place in real time, rather than as three separate transactions (viewing text (on the run), viewing bill (at your desk), paying bill (at home).
• Is it respectful of the customer’s time? New technologies like Virtual Hold allow a caller to forego waiting in queue by having the system maintain the caller’s place in line and call them back when an agent becomes available (or at a time agreeable to the caller).
• Will it quietly steer the customer to a better solution if one exists? I like the IVR hold schemes that offer tips or better calls to action, whether or not they actually produce one on the spot. Even better if the solution is unique and “smart” enough to warrant a “wow” reaction. I had this experience where I was attempting a complicated installation, and the hold narrative mentioned a site that there were video tutorials available. That was better than another instrumental version of “Just the Way You Are,” and far better than “you can visit our website”.
• Will it produce a notable distinction between what occurs and what a customer was expecting? I know that sounds trite, but very few actually do. Remember, it’s not only the magnitude of the distinction, but how meaningful the result is as well. Significantly reducing the wait time on-hold isn’t going to buy you much good will if the service the customer receives remains inadequate. I use the term “refreshingly responsive” (implying responsive, but with a useful but unexpected touch — the service equivalent of lagniappe).

One of my clients uses the term “smart value” when describing a product transaction that is reinforcing to the customer (I made a good choice, and I feel smart for having done so). I would argue that the same dynamic is possible with transactions. Admittedly, it’s very challenging to make a customer feel good about making a call to resolve an issue. But I’ve gotta tell you, when it happens, it certainly carries a loyalty premium.

And that’s how we redefine WOW!

-b

Bob Champagne is Managing Partner of onVector Consulting Group, a privately held international management consulting organization specializing in the design and deployment of Performance Management tools, systems, and solutions. Bob has over 25 years of Performance Management experience with primary emphasis on Customer Operations in the global energy and utilities sector. Bob has consulted with hundreds of companies across numerous industries and geographies. Bob can be contacted at bob.champagne@onvectorconsulting.com

I’ll jump right on that!! Five simple words that can either convey the attitude of a person eager and motivated to get something done, or a sarcastic way of declining a request based on it being either an uninspiring or unrewarding experience (or perhaps both).

Much of what we know about performance management comes from the behavioral sciences and the work of legendary psychologist B. F. Skinner. In case you missed that day in your Psych 101 class, basic behaviorism is built on the simple concept of providing a tangible reward–a piece of food in the case of experimental animals–in response to the correct achievement of some basic task (or, conversely, the withholding of a reward–or administration of a penalty of some sort–for failure to complete the task).

Pigeons, Teenagers, and Everything In Between

When we talk about the field of performance management–be it measurement, goals and targets, tracking and reporting, performance communications, back-end rewards, or the myriad of other “moving parts”  within the performance management process–we are really talking about elements that are at the core of managing human behavior.

While most of  us regard performance management techniques as a way to motivate our organizations and employees to achieve “peak performance” levels, the same techniques can be used in an infinite number of other areas, across both the work and personal spectrum. Remember, while Skinner’s subjects were originally pigeons, his techniques have been applied effectively in everything from corporate performance to the most basic of personal transactions with our children… and everything in-between.

…and Yes, Customers Too!

Recently, I’ve been giving a good deal of thought to how we can use these same principles in our relationships with customers. There are many things we do to encourage customers to behave in certain ways. Whether it’s  buying more of a product, maintaining allegiance to our brand, or other more subtle changes we seek in customer behavior (shifting to less costly billing and payment channels, moving consumption to more optimal places in our delivery system, increasing utilization of our automated inquiry channels (website, IVR, etc.), participating in recycling campaigns, etc.), the age old “behavior modification” techniques used by the early behaviorists, still present in most of our performance management organizations, are just as, if not more, important to our relationships and interactions with customers. It’s all about creating a line of sight between a desired outcome and the behaviors required to drive it, keeping that line of sight visible, and ensuring that all requisite parts of the process are in place to motivate and reinforce staying on that path and consistently hitting the desired target.

A few days ago, a close friend of mine who enjoys spending an occasional weekend in Las Vegas (something I know very little about, or at least wouldn’t  admit to if I did!), received, during one of these periodic jaunts, a loyalty card from a casino offering him certain amenities whenever he visited their property–usually free (or at least that’s the spin they put on it) dinners, valet parking, etc. Personally, I find it hard to see these loyalty programs as being of any great value, since I’m sure the rewards pale in comparison to how much casinos “fleece” their patrons. But regardless of how I view that industry and their programs, my friend seems to enjoy them. And, well, who am I to judge?

After visiting the casino a few times in 2011, he received a letter letting him know that he had reached a new loyalty level (again, one has to wonder about achieving a new loyalty level at a casino whose primary mission it is to take your money. But let’s not digress again). After quickly congratulating him on achieving this “new loyalty tier”, the program manager went on to describe how close my friend was to reaching the next level beyond his newly attained one.

I may not have all of my numbers exactly right, but it went something like this: “Congratulations on achieving our Silver level by earning 15,000 points! You’re now only a few steps away from hitting the Gold level. By earning an additional 900,000 points, you’ll enjoy all the benefits of Silver PLUS all the many new benefits reserved exclusively for our Gold members!” etc, etc, etc…

Sometimes there is not enough oxygen on the planet to describe how many things are wrong with a particular business practice. This was one of those times. But the letter alone did most of the damage. Whatever the expenditures required to get to the “silver level” (and I really didn’t want to know the details), simple math told him that he’d need to spend many, many, many multiples of that to even approximate the next level. After a good laugh, his response was: “Sure, I’ll get right on that!”

Motivating Loyalty-

The good, the bad and the ugly…

Loyalty programs all include features of this sort: tiers of benefits that reward buying behavior, incentives for climbing to the next tier, quantifiable measures and tracking schemes that let you know how you are doing on your progress, and all the communication required to motivate you up and over the “next hurdle.” It doesn’t matter whether the program is for frequent fliers, hotel visitors, or even banking savers (an alternative I would encourage my friend to consider). There is no doubt that such programs work.

What differentiates the good ones is not simply the presence of elements like measures, goals, and rewards but, rather, the range of “moving parts” within the PM process I alluded to earlier. For example, let’s look inside my friend’s experience. It wasn’t the lack of a measurable outcome or awareness of what he had to do to get to the next tier that created the breakdown, but rather the enormous gap between the tiers (where the target was set), its level of achievability, and the manner in which progress was communicated.

Sometimes the issue is as simple as managing distinctions between tiers and levels. For a person like me who travels extensively, upgrades, for example, are certainly important. But as airlines continue to consolidate, customers who might have grown used to being consistently upgraded now find that while they were once big fish in a small pond, they have now become average-sized fish in a much larger lake. Anyone caught in the consolidation of the United and Continental loyalty programs knows this first-hand. In fact, there are now more “elite” than “non-elite” fliers (usually by a factor of two) competing for that “special boarding” privilege (essential for getting dibs on very scarce and valuable carry-on luggage space). So for me, the boarding privileges have become more valuable than the upgrade itself. Simply differentiating between platinum, gold, and silver elite fliers in the boarding process would improve the experience of those with the highest travel frequency. Further distinctions (within the higher tier) would also help to create more perceived equity within the ever growing mass of frequent travelers when it comes to upgrades.

More often than not, the differences lie in more subtle application of the “moving parts” within the process. There is a principle most of us may remember from that Psych 101 course that deals with the specifics of reinforcement “schedules” (variable/fixed intervals, for example). While it’s nice to get “upgraded” every single time we exhibit the expected behavior, true behaviorists would tell you that is a clear path to complacency (besides which, the experimenter–or in our case, the program manager–ends up spending a great deal more than necessary in rewards in order to achieve a desired result). Whether they are right or wrong in this assertion is not the issue; market research can answer that. The real issue is that nuances such as this remain very much in play and should not be simply ignored or overlooked in a program’s design. Most of us can recall a time as a customer when receiving an unexpected extra (what we in the south call lagniappe ) did, in fact, generate good will and motivate improved buy behavior. A colleague of mine talks about this quite extensively on his blog “Marketing Lagniappe,” and, although he does not purport to be a true southerner, he understands the concept and its application better than most that actually hail from the “Big Easy”.

Incorporating Performance Management into your CEM strategies…

Like any good chef, there are many ingredients that need to be mixed in the correct sequence, at the right temperature, and  presented in the right way to create that high-quality, positive experience. Same goes for designing our customer experiences:

• Are the incentives you’re offering ones customers even care about? How much time and energy are you wasting on deploying innovative tools that have more impact for you that they do for customers?
• Are your incentives easy for customers to redeem? .Small “point of sale” rebates are often have far more “relevant impact” than larger ones that require more customer effort to redeem (after adjusting for lower redemption levels)
• Do you rely on hidden tricks to manage program costs (e.g., points that expire, rewards that require supplemental cash payments, etc.) that can actually produce more negative that positive impact on customer experience?
• Are the measures you’re using easy and simple for customers to understand and use in tracking their progress to that next reward or level?
• Have you considered the effect of different reinforcement schedules? (Fixed versus variable intervals? Different types and quantity of rewards?
• Have you given enough thought to where program “targets” (rewards and tiers) are set?
• Are the targets achievable in reasonable amounts of time?
• Is your messaging and communication sufficiently compelling?

Clearly these techniques apply any time we are trying to convince someone to “jump right on it.” But in the world of customer experience, where competitive forces are always at play and differentiation is becoming more and more critical, it may just be the most important consideration in your product and program design.

-b

Bob Champagne is Managing Partner of onVector Consulting Group, a privately held international management consulting organization specializing in the design and deployment of Performance Management tools, systems, and solutions. Bob has over 25 years of Performance Management experience with primary emphasis on Customer Operations in the global energy and utilities sector. Bob has consulted with hundreds of companies across numerous industries and geographies. Bob can be contacted at bob.champagne@onvectorconsulting.com