Customer Service
The strength of the Australian economy can have a significant
impact on an organisation s customer service delivery.
Undersupply of skilled employees means:
• Organisations need to fill customer contact roles with
inexperienced people or people with lower
capability/knowledge than required when dealing with
customers.
• Lead times to fulfill roles lengthens and response/fulfillment
times for customers increase.
• Wages increase putting pressure on employee turnover and
resourcing if competitors pay more, again increasing
response times for customers.
Addressing these points presents an opportunity for
organisations to capture greater market share and increase
performance if they are prepared to focus on customer service
differentiation within the realities of their industry.
Customer service (internal and external) includes how
customers are greeted, how fast rapport is built with customers at each moment of truth etc.
Yet it is far more than these behavioural skills.
So what can managers do to ensure customer
service helps differentiation and organisational performance in a tight labour market?
1. Increased employee turnover means implicit customer knowledge is lost. Effective Customer
Relationship Management (CRM) systems are therefore critical.
2. Undersupply puts more
pressure on other employees who need to be rewarded and motivated. 3. New unskilled
employees need fast up-skilling and coaching to better fit roles.
4. Poaching from competitors
and loss of knowledge requires retention programs.
5. Seamless internal processes are needed
including cross functional team work to achieve best practice customer fulfillment. |
Personally speaking
Our anecdotal evidence suggests
that improved customer service is a
key focus for organisations
differentiation strategy hence the
topic in this issue. If you are not
onto this yet you could end up too
far behind. Please let us know if
you need any help.
New Professional
Development Show
Check our new online professional
development show about people
management, leadership and
organisational cultures. It includes
interviews with Bernie Brookes
CEO of Myer and Major John
Simmonds CEO of the Salvation
Army Employment Plus.
Please remember to tell others what
you like about this company and if
there is something you don t please
tell us
Kind regards, Sam
PS I hope everyone in Adelaide are
enjoying their extended summer! |
