Intelligent Manufacturing € July € 1995 € Vol. 1 € No. 7

Ten Steps to Best-in-Class Status

By Mike Donovan

Best-in-Class customer satisfaction is acknowledged as one of the leading ways to stand out in a crowded field of competitors. Industry surveys often list top-notch customer satisfaction as a leading concern of top-level managers. However, when the pressure is on, the reality is customer satisfaction often takes a back seat to other management concerns, especially cost reduction and profit generation.

This reality can lead to a rapid erosion in market share and a plunge in customer satisfaction. Management must take a proactive role in building Best-in-Class customer satisfaction at every level. Customer satisfaction when totally delegated downward just won't happen.

Customer satisfaction has become a potent competitive weapon capable of easily differentiating one supplier from another. A lot of talk today is centered around quality, reengineering, continuous improvement and the like, but all of it must be aimed at customer satisfaction or it isn't worth anything over the long term. The same old way of doing business is just not good enough. The accompanying chart offers 10 recommendations to managers who want to improve customer satisfaction.

Customer satisfaction can't be just a slogan. Not only must you feel that you excel at customer satisfaction, it must be a measurable result.

Customer Satisfaction Management:
Top 10 Recommendations

1. Take an active role in this critical corporate mission if you want to become the competitor that delights its customers. Do not delegate customer satisfaction downward.
2. Recognize that quality is a given and response time, delivery reliability, cost, and value-added services will be required to gain a competitive advantage.
3. Understand all of the underlying issues that prevent your company from delivering top-notch customer satisfaction.
4. Resist the temptation to take a piecemeal approach to customer satisfaction improvement simply because the root causes of problems seem too complex and interconnected to allow a truly integrated solution.
5. Base customer satisfaction improvement on a strong executive directive and an action plan containing the principles and tactics that will guide the organization to positive and permanent change.
6. Survey customers to find out what they think your company's strengths and weaknesses are versus your competitors. Listen and respond.
7. Focus the company's internal activities on quality and response time improvement.
8. Tie the measurement system for customer satisfaction improvement to the reward system for management and, if possible, all employees.
9. Conduct regular cross-functional meetings to discuss what's working, what's not and what actions need to be taken.
10. Develop a results-driven, tactically-oriented action plan with the goal of providing the best customer satisfaction in your industry.