If you have a great Mission, Vision and Values, they most likely address customers since all organizations exist to meet a human (i.e., customer) need. So, how do you create a culture around customers?
It’s simple in concept, but hard to execute (kind of like riding a bull). It starts with developing a customer-first attitude within yourself. Everything you do has to put the customer first. Second, your communication should be primarily around how the organization is meeting and exceeding customer expectations. This is accomplished through the development of a robust customer satisfaction survey, rigorous review of the survey results, development of action plans to address customer concerns, and continual communication about the results and action plans.
Also, employees have to be given permission to make any customer satisfaction shortcoming right. That could involve the creation of an approach that gives EVERY employee authorization to spend up to $50 for service recovery. At first this seems like it could get out of control, but having seen this done in several organizations, employees know when to use it and it doesn’t cost that much.
