Focus on the Customer and Employee Experience to Transform Your Business

A simple pathway to success is consistently delivering on the promise you make to customers and employees

Focus on the Customer and Employee Experience to Transform Your Business

Jason Bradshaw

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As a busy business owner, you are faced with a seemingly endless list of things to do to keep your company operating and an ever-increasing list of ideas on how to improve it.

It can be overwhelming, so perhaps consider throwing out the hundred plus to-do items and ideas. Instead, focus on the experience you deliver to customers and your employees. Start with these three fundamental steps:

1. Define the promise

2. Measure the gaps

3. Share the stories

Before unpacking these steps, let’s clarify a couple of important elements. 

First, the term experience. In this context it means customer experiences, employee experiences, the experiences that you promise, and ultimately, the ones you deliver. You may even make experience promises about your brand and products. For now, we’re going to focus on customer and employee experiences. Also, the singular experience — the transaction — is just as important as the plural, collective experiences. 

Finally, let’s be clear that the customer and employee experience does not mean hugging your haters, nor does it mean surprising your customers/employees with champagne and caviar. 

Each of these steps applies to customers and employees equally. If you don’t know where to start, begin with your employees’ experiences. Investing in improving your employees’ experience will result in increased productivity and improved customer experiences. 

Step 1: Define the promise 

This step comes in two parts. It starts with defining what you mean by the words “customer/employee experience.” It is crucial to define what you mean by the term to ensure that every team member understands it. Part two is defining what you promise to deliver for your customers/employees. 

Every day people check in to two-star hotels and fly low-fare airlines, while at the same time people also check in to five-star hotels and fly first class. In both instances, there are companies that make a profit and those that don’t. The difference is clear. Some companies compete on price, and others — who win — do so by delivering consistently on the experience that their ideal customers are drawn to and are willing to pay for. 

Don’t be afraid of defining your promise and sharing it broadly. There are customers who will choose your company, and your promise, over your competitors if you deliver on that promise consistently. 

Beyond prospective customers being drawn to your promise, the superpower of defining your promise is that every team member will understand that above all else their priority is to deliver on the promise. 

Step 2: Measure the gaps

After you’ve defined what you promise to deliver, it is time to measure the gap between the promises and the reality. To get started, just measure the gap between one of your promises. Your main promise. 

For example, if you promise to deliver service within 24 hours, start measuring how often you actually deliver within 24 hours. If you 100% of the time deliver within the promise, then start measuring the gap of the next promise. 

However, if you aren’t delivering on your main promise, then your mission is to focus on closing the gap, every day being 1% closer. 

Step 3: Share the stories

Companies send out surveys to measure the gap. But don’t be one of those companies that sends out surveys and then keeps all the data locked up. 

The power of the third step is in sharing with your team and celebrating the impact of delivering on your promise. The celebration of delivering on your promise reinforces what great looks like and the behaviors required to achieve success.

However, it is also important to share, just as broadly, the stories and the impact on customers when you fail to deliver on your promise. This not only reinforces the value of delivering on the promise, it provides a clear coaching point. An opportunity to identify, and fix, what processes, systems or tasks create the break in delivering on your promise.

About the Author

For the past three decades, Jason Bradshaw has worked with some of the world’s most recognizable brands, improving the experience to transform the business. He is a best-selling author and an expert on customer experience and experience management. Visit www.jasonbradshaw.com.



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