Employees & the Customer Experience: What Companies Can Do

As promised in my last post, here are the findings of Maritz’s 2006 Customer Experience study:

  • Almost half of all customers (43%) who defect do so because of service
  • 77% of these customer blame their leaving on employee attitude
  • 83% of these customers tell someone else.

Maritz’s white paper, “Delight or Defection: The Pivotal Role of People Inside the Customer Experience,” also outlines its approach on how companies can positively impact employee behavior:

  • Better (deeper) measurement of the customer experience:
  • Localized, “grass-roots” intervention (more on this shortly)
  • Meaningful motivation
  • Integrated & aligned action.

I especially like Maritz’s combination top-down & bottom-up strategy to enabling and driving change at the local level: share research results with employees … obtain their input on improving the customer experience … and facilitate action plans based on the research & particulars of the organization at that locale. According to Maritz, “Co-development of learning and action plans with front-line staff generates relevancy, greater participation, and employee buy-in.”

More on Maritz’s approach in my next post …

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