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 COVER
STORY The human touch THE HUMAN TOUCH – A VITAL COMPONENT OF SERVICE Have you ever
had someone call to service your appliances at home and thought
how off-hand or unhelpful they were, as if they were doing you a favour by showing up in the first place? Only afterwards does it
occur to you that you were the one paying them for that service,
although it felt like it was the other way round! Recent research
indicates that, if a field service provider delivers an acceptable
level of service relative to their competitors, only 30% of what
the customer will remember is the mechanical execution of that
field service and 70% will be how 'humanly' the service provider's
staff and technicians interact with their company. Yet,
surprisingly, less than 10% of company resources are invested in
how 'humanly' they interact with their customers. According to
leading author John McKean, when customers are faced with a choice
between companies with similar service capabilities and rates,
they choose the provider whose interactions are most human – ie,
treats them best. In our cover story in this issue, McKean
investigates the impact of the human touch and the consequences
businesses face when it isn't present. If anyone is not aware of
exactly how their service engineers interact with the very people
who keep their business in existence, this could well prove to be
worrying in the extreme. BRIAN WALL EDITOR
Research shows
that it is the human touch that customers most remember when the
field service technician calls, yet this aspect is often the most
neglected by service organisations, says leading author John
McKean
Recent
research indicates that, if a field service provider delivers an
acceptable level of service relative to their competitors, only
30% of what the customer will remember is the mechanical execution
of that field service and 70% will be how 'human' the service
provider's staff and technicians interact with their company. Yet,
surprisingly, less than 10% of company resources are invested in
how 'humanly' they interact with their customers.
 In today's competitive
service market, certain harsh realities exist:
• effective field
service execution is a minimum requirement just to survive
• most competing field
service providers have relatively similar abilities to deliver
field services
• most competing field
service providers have relatively similar rate structures.
When customers are
faced with a choice between companies with similar service
capabilities and rates, they choose the provider whose
interactions are most human, ie treats them best. Therefore, the
biggest opportunity for competitive differentiation for field
service providers is a company's 'human touch'.
A company's human
touch can be thought of as an age-old art that has traditionally
been practised arbitrarily and inconsistently at an individual
level. The challenge for field service providers is to implement
this art as a consistent and unanimous science across your entire
organisation. The first step of implementing this science is to
begin thinking of your field technicians and the staff that
support them as people. The second step is to think of your
customers as people. They are all people, first and foremost, just
as we are all people.
The truth is that your
customers simply want the best service at the best price for their
company, and also want themselves and their co-workers to be
treated as human beings in every interaction.
To begin evolving a
field service provider's human touch, a company must address the
following critical human touch factors:
• treat field
technicians and support staff like human beings
• address the three
primary human needs of customers: acknowledge them, show respect
and build trust
• communicate humanly
with customers
• implement the human
touch consistently across all business functions
• integrate humanness
as a defined process
• design supporting
technology to humanise (not dehumanise).
If 70% of what
customers remember is how 'humanly' they are treated, then the
next important question is what determines how humanly the staff
treat the customer? Research shows a 75% correlation between how
management treat staff and how staff treat customers.
The study covered six
business units over two years, using quarterly summary
measurements. Roughly 50,000 employees were surveyed over six
business units, serving 50 large corporate customers. Not only was
a strong correlation discovered between employee fulfilment and
customer fulfilment, but this also extended to fluctuations in
share price.
These three elements
represent the classic behavioural business cycle, ie happy
employees tend to create happy customers, which positively affects
share price and profitability.
One particular
telecommunications firm actively tracked employee and customer
satisfaction for two to three years, using quarterly summary
measurements. The correlation between customer satisfaction and
employee satisfaction was .75 during eight measurement periods.
The correlation was stronger than coincidental, while the
conclusions were intuitive and statistical.
Respect
customers while building trust
Transforming the art
of the 'human touch' begins with understanding the basic needs of
people. The most important question to answer is what behaviours
matter most to people? Our research has found that people have
three primary human needs and their corresponding emotional
expectations: acknowledgement, respect and trust
Acknowledging
customers – understanding how best to fulfill the human need for
acknowledgment. Activities should focus on acknowledging the
customer's existence, importance, characteristics and feelings. It
is also important to focus on eliminating behaviours (intentional
or unintentional) that create feelings of being ignored and
anonymous.
Treating customers
with respect – understanding how best to fulfill the human need
for respect should centre on their dignity as human beings.
Sending messages of respect starts with basic common courtesies
and extends into such areas as respect for the customer's time,
privacy, personal space, home and diversity. Equally as important
is focusing on eliminating behaviours that convey disrespect.
Building trust with
customers – actions to build trust in customers should be focused
on honesty, ethics, integrity, openness, educating customers and,
most importantly, operational excellence. It is also important to
focus on eliminating behaviour which creates distrust.
Initial trust is
either confirmed and strengthened, or is disproved and decreases,
based on the customer's service experience.
Communicate
humanly with customers
Positive interactions
with customers cannot be accomplished without understanding, and
then developing, the skills to create the most effective human
communication between employee and customer. This involves
becoming a better listener, as well as a better communicator to
customers, both verbally and non-verbally. Here are some basics:
• listen first
• listen to fulfil the
desire just to be heard
• humanness is best
face-to-face
• listening without
judgment
• let them teach you
how to best communicate with them
• prepare staff for
effective responses after listening
• listen to customer
issues and then communicate them for systemic resolution
• be open and honest
about problems as soon as they occur
• determine whether it
needs to be 'fixed' or just further 'education' is called for
• show them
accessibility – communicate approachability
• reinforce the impact
and importance of simple common courtesies
• communicate your
value that is: relative to competitors, easily differentiated
• use everyday words,
not business or technical jargon, whenever possible;
• don't assume
communication has been effective
• train staff for
effective non-verbal communication skills
• 55% of
communications is body language, 38% vocal intonations and
inflections, and 7-8% the actual words
• make employees
physically identifiable
• communicate only
valued information and in the manner they want. SM
In the next issue,
John McKean discusses how to implement the human touch right
across the business.
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