“Optimizing the Customer Experience”
I was thrilled to be invited to deliver a presentation for CareerSource Suncoast at their Employee Retreat & Talent Development Day.
My session “Exceptional Service: Enhancing the Customer Experience” stressed the importance of optimizing the customer experience throughout the various touchpoints with their organization. Those interactions define who you are in the mind of the customer, which can be a determining factor in them becoming or remaining a customer with you.
The presentation cited research that found that customers who experience greater value throughout their experience can improve both product use and loyalty.
Employees learned concepts and participated in exercises as a framework to spark ideas and to rethink current customer experience practices for potential improvement opportunities.
“Living the non-negotiables”
In my previous newsletter I discussed establishing non-negotiables in creating an “organizational-engaged” culture. I described it as holistic system of performance and behavioral expectations for management, supervisors and employees.
My recommendation was to integrate these as benchmarks into everyday business practices and interactions such as hiring, managing, communicating and branding. What would this look like?
- Plan & Vision: communicate what you want to accomplish and how you will do it
- Get Involvement: start conversations with your team gathering their observations of the current culture, values and mission to define the non-negotiables and everyone’s input on what changes might be needed to be a more organizationally-engaged workplace.
- Manage Performance: along with job specific ratings, include non-negotiables and expectations as a work culture component of all employee performance reviews.
- Recruitment & Hiring: Use behavioral and situational interviewing to gauge the candidate’s skills and qualities that are consistent with your organizational-engagement expectations.
- Employment Branding: communicate “Why would you work here?” on your website, career page, social media, and during job application process to reinforce the employment experience value your workforce enjoys and to attract new employees.
- Manage Message: insure your organizational-engagement experience and practices are reflected at brand touchpoints including direct sales, retail floor, reception, interview process, job fairs and conference booths and signage.
“Establishing Non-Negotiables for an Organizationally-Engaged Culture”
In my newsletter “Ten Strategies to Foster an Employee-Engaged Culture”, I wrote about the global pandemic crises’ impact on the world of work: forcing change on how we manage, supervise and operate our businesses. I presented a blueprint to become a more employee-engaged culture to both attract job candidates and retain current employees resulting in meeting customer needs and improved outcomes.
It involved the organization’s commitment to an environment where employees, for example, can develop, work independently, or be encouraged to share their ideas and input.
It also entails the employee’s role; their accountability to their job responsibilities, co-workers, customers and organizational growth.
I describe it as a holistic culture of “organizational- engagement“: management, supervisors and employees.
Where do you begin? Attempt to reduce any ambiguity for what is expected. Consider establishing the non-negotiables that you are committed to in creating an organizational-engaged work culture by defining and clarifying behavioral and performance expectations for everyone in the organization. Then integrate these as benchmarks into everyday practices and interactions such as hiring, managing, communicating and branding. Non-negotiable examples include:
- Ownership of responsibilities, deadlines and outcomes
- Collaborative, sharing of information and expertise
- Proactive in improving the customer experience
- Employees are valued and treated with respect
- Strategy and goals are written, discussed and understood
- Difference opinion are expressed freely
“Rethinking How You Hire”
I enjoyed the opportunity to work with the Greater Raritan Workforce Development Board to create and deliver to business employers the webinar “Championing Your Employee Brand as a Recruitment Strategy”. This program was intended to assist employers with today’s recruiting and staffing challenges with solutions on how to answer the question “Why would someone work for your organization?”
Participants left the the session rethinking how they hire, with practical ideas and action steps to integrate the employee brand experience into the recruitment and selection process, including valuable takeaways for recruitment best practices for immediate application back on the job.
Don’t hesitate to call or email me for additional information on offering this program for your organization.
“The Garden State Employment & Training Association Conference”
I enjoyed the opportunity to be invited by The Garden State Employment & Training Association (www.GSETA.org) to present “Business Engagement and Sales Practices: Effectively Servicing the Employer” for their 2021 Fall Virtual Conferenc
I presented the notions that “most of us are in roles involving service, customer engagement and sales and that each customer contact by every employee is an opportunity to make a positive impression to gain new customers and to retain current customers.”
My key take-aways were to take a strategic approach and that competence in sales, service and business developmentare essential to maximize growth outcomes.
Participants left the session with increased confidence when presenting their scope of services: having new tools and a better understanding of the business and sales engagement process, including customer growth strategies, and establishing measures and standards to gauge effectiveness in servicing customers. They also benefited from exercises to reinforce learning and for ready application of new practices at work.