Four Features of Outstanding Service Organizations
These four features are relatively simple in concept and easy to understand.
Yet making them a reality is almost always a monumental task, especially in
large organizations. These four important features differentiate outstanding
service organizations from mediocre ones:
- Understanding the customer's moments of truth. A moment of truth is any
point at which a customer comes into contact with any aspect of the
organization and has a chance to form an impression of the quality of
service provided. Customer approval is won or lost one moment of truth at a
time.
- A well conceived strategy for service. A service strategy is the unifying
idea that outstanding service organizations have discovered, invented or
evolved about what they do. It differentiates the company from its
competitors. This service concept, or service strategy, directs the
attention of the people in the organization toward the real priorities of
the customer. When this guiding concept is communicated to everyone in the
organization, it finds its way into everything they do. It becomes a
rallying cry, a kind of gospel, and the nucleus of the message to be
transmitted to the customer.
- Customer-friendly systems. The delivery systems are a means of
distributing the organization's resources, based on service strategy and the
package of services it intends to deliver. Successful service delivery
systems become habitual and thus invisible. The physical facilities,
policies, procedures, methods and communication processes all say to the
customer, "This apparatus is here to meet your needs."
- Customer-oriented front-line people. Without well-trained, well-managed,
motivated people, good service cannot be delivered. Front-line people must
be empowered to work on behalf of the customer through knowledge, policy and
culture. The effective front line person is able to maintain an otherworldly
focus of attention by tuning in to the customer's current situation, frame
of mind and need. This leads to a level of responsiveness, attentiveness,
and willingness to help that marks the service as superior in the customer's
mind and makes him or her want to tell others about it and come back for
more.
-- From "Service America in the New Economy," which can be purchased through
the SOCAP International Resource Center Bookstore.
