Challenges and opportunities at customer experience programs

Leandro Mello Bacellar has written an article on his interpretation of the Global State of Operational Excellence Survey Report - Critical Challenges & Future Trends - 2018/2019. Click here to read the full Survey Report 2018/19. 

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Challenges and opportunities at customer experience programs

Changing business Environment

The business environment is changing at high speed, like we have never seen before, mainly due to evolving consumer behaviour, new digital capabilities and innovation. One common perspective among companies leading this highly competitive environment is the customer centricity strategy which drives their culture, success and purpose. Click here to read more Articles on The Global State of Operational Excellence: Critical Challenges & Future Trends - Research Report 2018/19.

The "Costumer era"

Experts and strategists are calling this business cycle a “customer era”, where customers are in charge as they decide what, where, how and when to purchase. This is a big shift from the previous Eras of information, distribution and manufacturing where basically customer value was measured by functional benefits minus financial cost.

Challenges and Opportunities on the Journey

A company embarking on this great journey might face challenges and opportunities that could award them with success and great achievements, or with pitfalls and hurdles that could drag the motivation and efforts down. Setting the customer as the main reason to exist and perform is not an easy task for companies that come from financial, product or technology centric approaches. It is a complex and strong shift and even companies working on CX programs for a long time often reverse back to the inside out approaches.

One example about maturity level in companies performing CX programs is how customer satisfaction or NPS (Net promoter Score) KPI’s are presented in those companies’ quarter or annual results at their internal communication meetings. Some might regress in maturity and present this as the last and least important KPI or sometimes failing to mention altogether.

Key challenges might come from who at the “C” company level is the main champion implementing and reinforcing the CX program when it is time to celebrate or when mistakes are made. Such mistakes and celebrations are part of the learning curve and should be used to improve and refine the company´s operation. Good practices show that, when the board of directors discusses how the company can deliver more economic benefits and fewer hassles for customers, the central engine is on.

E2E full involvement

Operational excellence initiatives play a very important role when CX programs’ frameworks are structured with pillars based on employee engagement, customer engagement, excellence in execution and growth. They can boost the program by getting E2E full involvement. Challenges are mainly around change management process and a common constraint is to move from the program awareness to execution while consistently striving to embed customer value metrics as customer satisfaction and NPS (Net Promoter Score) to all company level employees.

It is important to make sure that every single person understands what they can do and how they can maximize customer value and reduce internal waste. Taking advantage of lean practices will enable cross functional teams to close the loop and maximize customer loyalty. On average financial CX program good practices results lead to 20% to 30% increase in operating income and internal efficiency. Also leading CX programs are already delivering financial results around 2.5 more profitable than their competitors.

Overall pitfalls, such as silos thinking, conflict in KPI’s and lack of sense of urgency for changing will be always part of the journey. However, focus on continuous improvement will pave the way forward. Have fun.