Customer Experience – do you get it?

Did you miss THE webinar discussion Customer Experience?
Fear not my astute colleague, follow the link(s) below and fill your boots.

Webinar Foundations of Customer Centricity (45 mins)
**New Book** Foundations of Customer Centricity
Not as new Book Outside-In (2010)
http://bit.ly/Outsidein2015
CEMMethod Webinar & Download
http://bit.ly/cem2015
Connect with Steve Towers http://twitter.com/stowers
Connect with James Dodkins http://twitter.com/jdodkins

Visit the site http://www.bpgroup.org


Certified Process Professional Masters (CPP-Master) Program
Orlando USA March 16-20, Denver USA March 23-27, Dubai UAE Apr 12-16http://www.bpgroup.org/book-class.html
An internationally recognized program with proven track record delivered by been there and done it coaches more than 130 times, in 52 cities with delegates from 105 countries.
The program, now in its tenth year, utilizes the BP Groups approaches and framework to help you and your organization win the triple crown – simultaneously reduce costs, grow revenues and enhance service.
Producing Immediate and sustainable business results across any industry and sector.
Become a qualified CPP-Master and demonstrate your professionalismhttp://www.bpgroup.org/book-class.html

Popular articles from the year just gone

Customer Experience came to the fore in 2014 and that was reflected in the most popular reads for the year. Here’s the top 100….

In theory, theory is great but in practice theory …
Say what you do, do what you say
Understanding Customer Needs
You cannot manage the future by micro managing the…
Why are Lean and Six Sigma failing so badly?
Customer Experience Management – the truth
Customer Experience Management Method updated appr…
Customer Experience – what is it?
Customer Experience through a looking glass
When you say End to End what do YOU mean?
Business Process Management (BPM) meets Customer E…
It is Needs not wants, stupid.
Start trusting people (it works)
The New Rules of Selling
What you measure is what you get. Stop measuring d…
Who should you read? Who should you follow?
Moment of Truth at Starbucks
Customer Experience definitions
Customer Experience Management reduces costs, grow…
Process mapping – Journey maps?
The failure of VoC programs is systemic. VoC lack…
A compelling Customer Experience
Amazons tale of Outside-In (or working backwards a…
The same old same old.
Are you doing dumb stuff really well?
Enabling customer centric business through process…
Customer Experience trumps standardization
CEMMethod (updated) download new material
Customer Experience is BMW
CPP Masters – 2 days in one minute
Certified Process Professionals at PEX in Sydney
Why BPM fails (and what to do about it)
Customer Experience is all about people (yup you a…
The power of Thankyou – 8 million times over
Down-Under is tops at Outside-In
Outside-In wins the Triple-Crown+
Navy Seals, Stress and Success
The illusion of Process Modeling
Getting it together
Process Excellence in Australia and New Zealand
BPM helping in healthcare
Snapshot (1 minute) of CPP Level 1&2 workshop
Calling wannabe Colorado Certified Process Profess…
Certification in Customer Experience Management, P…
Recommended Conferences for Customer Experience, B…
Customer Experience and Outside-In
Mastering digital marketing – McKinsey’s David Ede…
Download the latest (version 8) CEMMethod and asso…
Advanced BPM (Outside-In) Glossary
The man with a new idea is a crank..
Learn by Doing –
Outside-In – overview (5 min vid)
Turning your customers into long term assets
10 ways to know whether the customer comes first
Reflecting on his success – a Virgin still?
Digital Disruption – the what, how and where
The CEMMethod infographic
Accredited Champions, Professionals and Masters.
Customer Experience and all those new found expert…
Certified Process Professional growth since 2013
Where is your work ethic mate?
How Wolves Change Rivers and how you can change yo…
You have got to start with the Customer Experience…
FREE BPM-CEM-OutsideIn course. And receive a compl…
6 Tips for Understanding Customer Needs, even when…
Royal Bank of Scotland – have they finally got the…
CEMMethod step 2: Crafting the Successful Customer…
Will you Fail?
Moments of Magic, Moments of Misery and Moments of…
Process Excellence in Singapore
Six steps to winning with the Customer Experience
ɯoʇʇoq oʇ doʇ puɐ ʇɥƃıɹ oʇ ʇɟǝl ʇou sı plɹoʍ ǝɥʇ
BPM Resources from the BP Group (updated)
Customer Experience. Two dirty words.
The And or Or of Customer Experience (interview fr…
Scrap the IVR. Talk to customers.
Successful Customer Outcomes Revolution (SCORe)
Public Service and Process
Steve Towers PEX Professional Development
PEX Network Interview: Forget tick box exercises: …
Twenty Twenty future vision – put Customer Experie…
Join the process miracle, access a free course and…
Customer Experience Challenges: Why Maintaining an…
Process Transformation (PT). What is the meaning o…
How to Create an Entirely Different Customer Exper…
Outside-In and CEM books
Customer Experience Management is
The Road to Hell is Paved with good intentions
Customer Experience (CX) is all about Engineering
Everything old is bad and antiquated and not every…
Are you doing Needs of Customer. or sadly its prev…
You get what you measure – how do you know you are…
Three Steps to Process and Customer Nirvana
How do you start the journey to Enterprise BPM/Out…
Points of Failure – How to remove and improve (3 m…
Can you trust your call centre – a tale of Enterpr…
Business Process Management – what is it? How can …
Moments of Truth – What are they and how can they …
PEX USA – another great win for IQPC
Process Excellence and the Customer – Are they mut…
What Business are you really In?
Delivering success… achieving consensus?!


Certified Process Professional Masters (CPP-Master) Program
Orlando USA March 16-20, Denver USA March 23-27, Dubai UAE Apr 12-16http://www.bpgroup.org/book-class.html
An internationally recognized program with proven track record delivered by been there and done it coaches more than 130 times, in 52 cities with delegates from 105 countries.
The program, now in its tenth year, utilizes the BP Groups approaches and framework to help you and your organization win the triple crown – simultaneously reduce costs, grow revenues and enhance service.
Producing Immediate and sustainable business results across any industry and sector.
Become a qualified CPP-Master and demonstrate your professionalismhttp://www.bpgroup.org/book-class.html

Say what you do, do what you say

Managing customer expectations and creating the experience to deliver it makes good sense. 


Why is it then almost an after-thought for most large corporates? At best it seems happen chance. 

The way to success is to put the effort into creating successful customer outcomes (SCO) and then managing customers expectations to them.

Craft the associated experience and ensure all the interactions (external and internal) contribute to this SCO.

Another perspective? See http://www.successfulcustomeroutcomes.net/2014/11/customer-experience-management-truth.html


Certified Process Professional Masters (CPP-Master) Program
(Dubai UAE Dec 7-11, Orlando US Jan 22-23, Denver US Jan 26-30, London UK Mar 2-6)
www.bpgroup.org/certification-by-city.html

An internationally recognised program with proven track record delivered by been there and done it coaches more than 130 times, in 52 cities with delegates from 105 countries.
The program, now in its tenth year, utilizes the BP Groups approaches and framework to help you and your organization win the triple crown – simultaneously reduce costs, grow revenues and enhance service. Producing Immediate and sustainable business results across any industry and sector.

Become a qualified CPP-Master and demonstrate your professionalism.www.bpgroup.org/certification-by-city.html

Enabling customer centric business through process (workshop)

What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas?!
Well I certainly hope not as we host a 3 hour workshop on 29 Sep at Caesars Palace at the The Business Performance Excellence Summit. Attendees will potentially have their opinion and practice of process changed forever with hands-on insights, tools and techniques. I will be sharing some of the content from my upcoming book “High Performance Organizations” and providing 10+ Gb of information as takeaways.

Join me and the team from IQPC to see what will happen in Vegas.
Here’s the skinny of the workshop with links:

Workshop link | Conference link
Classically process activity has focused on improving productivity, efficiency and effectiveness. Methods and approaches have evolved over decades to help organizations streamline, remove waste and standardize processes to great effect. In fact the American economic success story can be attributed to these fine efforts from global companies. However times have changed and we must change with them.

This session will discuss and review some of the ‘new’ approaches and techniques developed in 21st century leading companies from diverse sectors such as aviation, pharmaceutical, retail fashion, technology and banking. We will look at the common ingredients of their success and how using the power of process linked with customer centric strategy and operations produces a winning and sustainable formula suited to the challenges of today and tomorrow.

Delegates will go away with:
• Overview of the ‘new’ methods and approaches
• Three proven techniques to provide immediate cost reductions, revenue improvements and customer satisfaction improvements
• The 101 Guide to linking process to successful customer outcomes
• In addition delegates will gain access to (a) quick guides, (b) videos, (c) case studies and (d) work sheets for immediate use
• Copy of Steve Towers latest book, The High Performance Organization


Workshop link | Conference link

Oh and let’s finish with a Julius Ceasarism (slightly edited)

Outside-In wins the Triple-Crown+

When the Upside is greater than the pain of adopting something new, a new approach can breakthrough. If however the upside is not sufficient, then the status quo will remain.
So if you don’t want change personally or in your organization keep doing what you have always done. That way you will get what you have always got.

On the other hand if change is necessary you need to demonstrate a significant upside, whether that is in terms of cost reduction, revenue improvement, service enhancement and better compliance – that is the triple crown plus.

Ideally the approach you adopt will give you the capability to deliver all triple crown benefits simultaneously and in a truly sustainable, repeatable pattern.

That is precisely what the Outside-In philosophy is all about.

*** Need to know more?

> Customer Experience Management Method http://www.cemmethod.com
> Articles and Case Studies http://www.successfulcustomeroutcomes.net
> Accreditation and Certification http://www.bpgroup.org/certification-by-city.html
> Get the book (that even CEO’s can understand) http://www.outsideinthesecret.com/
> Connect on http://twitter.com/stowers  and http://twitter.com/jdodkins
> Join the community https://www.linkedin.com/groups/BP-Group-1062077

Process Excellence in Australia and New Zealand

With just a few days to go Australia is gearing up for the Annual Process Excellence conference in Sydney. Along side the unique and exclusive case studies there is networking and exchanging of stories covering process, performance, customer experience management and the digital customer. 

In addition to the networking and learning there is also the Annual Awards process. The categories are extensive including: 
 

–>

·     Best Improvement Deployment Project – Large Organisation Award
·     Best Deployment Leader Of The Year Award
·     Best Customer-Experience Improvement Initiative Of The Year Award
·     Business Transformation CEO of the Year
·     Young Business Improvement Practitioner of the Year

In 2014  I had the pleasure of presenting Dr. Morgan Jones (Executive

Manager at Commonwealth Bank) with the Award for Biggest Contribution to Business Improvement Industry in Australasia, and Business Improvement Manager of the Year. Morgan has also been acknowledged in 2013 with fellowship in the Institute of Mechanical Engineers to reinforce his standing in both Australia and on the world stage.



Join Morgan and other leading process professionals at this years 10th Process Excellence event: http://bit.ly/PEX_Sydney

Download the latest (version 8) CEMMethod and associated resources

BP Groups 22nd annual Survey and new materials exercise underway. Provide your feedback by answering just 7 questions and get access to the very latest materials.

The CEMMethod   has just completed into version 8 and has significantly more hand holding than before. We have incorporated the latest thinking and ‘next’ practice so its bang upto the minute for new and veteran practitioners.

Access the survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/Z5VZ2QG

10 ways to know whether the customer comes first

Stop making dumb things happen faster for less money!
A lot of companies pay lip service to customer-centricity, write contributors Steve Towers and James Dodkins, but not many “walk the talk”. Here are 10 differences between inside-out and outside-in companies.
There is a lot of talk today, more than ever, about customer centricity,
client focus, customer experience strategy and Outside-In. Many organizations have adopted aspects of these disciplines and where many have achieved monumental success others have fallen by the wayside. Why is this? The problem is perception.

Is your company just paying lip service to customers?

Countless organizations have said all the right things to make the workforce believe that they are becoming a customer-focused organization and then doing the complete opposite.
The effect of this is rising costs, shrinking revenues and ever lowering customer satisfaction.
The problem with this is that there is now a collective of organizations that have a “customer centricity doesn’t work” mentality. It’s like putting a rain hat in your pocket, going out into a storm, getting wet hair, then swearing the hat is useless. Just having the Outside-In customer centricity ideals is not enough; you have to use them in the right way.
So, how do you know if you work in an Outside-In organization or an Inside-Out organization wearing an Outside-In mask?
Table 1: Inside-Out or Outside-In?
Inside Out – attending to tasks and activities
Outside In – aligning to Successful Customer Outcomes (SCO’s)
Doing things right
Doing the Right things AND doing things right
1
Pyramidal management knows best
Context and customer defined
2
Business as a factory (left to right)
Customer Oriented Architectures
3
Benchmarking competitors
Determine customer needs and trends
4
Customer feedback retrospective
Customer needs designed and delivered
5
Process Improvement and optimization
Customer Experience innovation
6
DMAIC/SIPOC/DFSS/Lean
CEMMethod/4D’s
7
Improving efficiencies
Developing value for the customer
8
Model and method oriented
Customer journey and experience focus
9
Top down business architectures
Customer centric frameworks (context sensitive)
10
Remuneration for tasks completed
Rewards based on delivery of SCO’s

Let’s review the not so subtle differences

#1: Pyramidal management

Does your CEO really know the most about your organization? Can your CEO really relate to customers? Let’s face it, your CEO probably hasn’t spoken to a customer in years (if ever) so, why are they best qualified to determine how your organization is run? Maybe they aren’t…
#2: Business managed as a factory (left to right)

What percent of the work within your organization is manufacturing? What if you don’t manufacture anything? Then why does everything within your organization look like a factory?
We can’t meet the future with an industrial age mindset… join the rest of us in the 21st century.
#3: Benchmarking competitors
If you benchmark against other competitors you will, at best, only ever be as good as them, no better, most of the time worse and you will always be one step behind the trend.

Are you still managing a business that you think looks like this?
Rather than focusing on what your competitors are doing, focus on what the real need of the customer is and deliver that, innovate the customer experience, there is no easier way to become a market leader…let your competitors benchmark you. 
#4: Retrospective customer feedback
Asking customers “how did we do” is stupid, asking customers “how did we do” 3 weeks after it happened is even more stupid, allowing customer to self-select for a survey to tell you how you did 3 weeks after is happened is even more stupid than that.
If you want to get totally non-representative, inaccurate, and relatively useless data on how some customers may have felt you performed at some point then the traditional methods are fine (NPS, CSi, etc).
To measure a customer experience properly and objectively you need to first know what makes a great customer experience and measure if you are doing those things, we need to get scientific about the customer experience (CXRating).
If you are still in the land of subjective, self-selecting, retrospective feedback, chances are you have no idea just how well, or poorly, you are performing…even if you think you do.
#5: Focus only on process improvement and optimization
Taking what you are already doing and making it happen in a shorter time frame, more efficiently or for less operating cost is not good enough any more. If you are doing dumb things all you are doing is making dumb things happen faster for less money.
You should focus on innovating the customer experience. Any work within your organization is caused by a customer interaction somewhere down the line. If you engineer and innovate at the causal level, you will make the customer experience better and eliminate swathes of pointless dumb work that you are wasting time on every single day…simple really isn’t it?
#6: Trying to use DMAIC/SIPOC/DFSS/Lean to optimize the customer experience
If you are using process improvement methodologies that were created to optimize manufacturing processes to optimize the customer experience then you will find yourself in a mess.
Use a 21st century methodology like the CEMMethod that was designed for this day and age to really turbo charge your customer experience efforts. Have you ever heard the phrase “trying to fit a square peg into a round hole”? Methodologies like Lean and Six Sigma were great at what they were created to do, but they were not created to improve customer experience… and therefore won’t.
#7: Improving efficiencies for internal customers only
Trying to make things more efficient for yourselves inside your organization – more often than not – will actually make things worse for the customer. Don’t just perpetuate the Inside-Out mindset. You need to make sure that everything you are doing is actually creating value for customers. Don’t focus on internal customers, focus on real customers… they pay your wages.
#8: Model and method oriented
Don’t get shackled by the oppression of the models and methods that ‘the man’ has said you should use. You shouldn’t focus on trying to implement a model or method you should be focused on how to make the customer experience better… whatever it takes.
#9: Top down business architectures
Do you work in an environment when the person above you tells you what to do and you tell the people below you what to do? If your whole working life is focused on trying to make your boss happy what aren’t you focusing on?
That’s right, the customer.
As soon as we enter a habitat like this we make a habit out of ignoring what’s right for the customer over what is perceived to be right for the organization. I’m not saying you’ll be able to change this overnight, I’m just saying it’s wrong and will eventually lead to your organizations downfall… don’t get left behind.
#10: Remuneration for tasks completed
If you pay people for doing stupid things, they get very good at doing them. Traditionally, you will get paid for completing tasks and activities, filling in forms, processing invoices, taking calls etc.
If everyone (and I mean EVERYONE) was paid for delivering customer success just imagine how different your working environment would be. Empowering workers to be able to do whatever it takes to deliver customer success is the polar opposite of workers having to complete X number of forms in a day… this is maybe the biggest game changer of them all.
Steve Towers & James Dodkins