‘Customer synergy is the highest level of customer service and it delivers the highest level of customer loyalty. Nothing is as powerful. And, with it, you can leapfrog the competition’.Who said it? Dr. Stephen Covey, author of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.
Er…what does he mean? Well, as he’s going to be one of the keynotes at ECMW 2008 next month, I dug my notes out to give you a quick primer in advance. So, here’s your sneak preview of how to put the customer at the heart of your business, courtesy of Dr. Covey:
“Synergy happens when both supplier and customer are changed by the experience, creating something new that neither knows about in the beginning. That creates a bonding. Synergy assumes that a solution lies between ‘us’ and we find it together.
It takes a leap of imagination to craft customer service around the idea of synergy. But, as Einstein said: ‘Imagination is more powerful than knowledge’.
As the business climate evolves at white water speed, the danger to avoid is that of meeting new challenges with old, inappropriate responses.
You can avoid this disconnect between your organization and its customers by exploiting the four unique endowments that allow each of us to choose a course of action, rather than follow a prescribed and perhaps inappropriate response.
Many elements combine to produce customer service and they have to be aligned like a combination lock. Align and deploy them effectively within yourself and among your front line people and you will break down the four great barriers holding back most organizations that are trying to become more customer-centred:
i. No common purpose
ii. Low trust
iii. Disempowerment
iv. Misalignment ”
ABOUT THOSE SEVEN HABITS…
And, of course, you know what the Seven Habits are by heart, don’t you? Just temporarily misplaced them in the mental filing bank? Okay, here they are so you can impress someone by writing them on your sleeve and reeling them off in your next meeting…Don’t say we never give you anything:
i. Be Proactive
ii. Begin With The End In Mind
iii. Put First Things First
iv. Think Win/Win
v. Seek First To Understand, Then To Be Understood
vi. Synergize
vii. Sharpen The Saw (renew)
But, of course you do all those things anyway, don’t you…
Posted by Phil Dourado, www.PhilDourado.com
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