Towards a unified view of the customer – Interview with James McGourlay of OpenText
July 28, 2015How we transformed our organisation and our customer experience – Interview with Damian Thompson of Principality Building Society
August 19, 2015Imagine a scenario where you walk into a room, an office or a business and see a hive of activity. You are keen to resolve a customer experience problem or have a question answered so you ask: “Who’s in charge here?”
One person steps forward, raises their hand, identifies themselves as the CEO and says “I am.”
However, many of the group that are standing behind her shake their heads and either point to themselves, or various other colleagues, to suggest that they are the ones who are, in fact, in charge of customer experience.
That’s a troubling conclusion that has emerged from a new research report, published in late June, from Genesys in conjunction with The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) called “The Value Of Experience.” The report through interviews with 516 senior level executives across 21 countries explores the impact of customer experience efforts and leadership on business performance.
The headline finding of the study showed was that there is a direct correlation between customer experience and profitability and CEO engagement. In fact, when CEOs are in charge of customer experience initiatives:
- 58% of all companies surveyed reported higher profitability than their competitors; and
- 59% experience better revenue growth as a result of prioritizing customer experience investments.
However, digging into the results there is a very noticeable discrepancy between who CEOs think is in charge of customer experience initiatives and what their colleagues and reports say. The study found that whilst 72% of CEOs consider themselves in charge of leading customer experience transformation initiatives, only 27% of their colleagues believe this is the case.
Now, it may be natural for all CEOs to consider themselves in charge of, or responsible for, everything that goes on in their company. But, the survey goes on to uncover further discrepancies in alignment with respect to customer experience initiatives through a cross-functional analysis. The report found that whilst:
- 32% of respondents in IT believe that their CIO (Chief Information Officer) is in charge of customer experience transformation initiatives only 5% of their colleagues in sales, marketing and general management agree;
- 35% of those in sales and marketing believe that their CMO (Chief Marketing Officer) is in charge of customer experience transformation initiatives only 13% in general management and 6% in operations and production agree; and
- 19% of operations and production executives believe that that their COO (Chief Operations Officer) is in charge of customer experience transformation initiatives only 4% and 5% of their colleagues in sales and marketing and IT respectively agree.
This may not be a significant problem, or a problem that has manifested itself as yet, as around 80% of all respondents in the survey didn’t perceive a problem with the lack of leadership or organisational structure when it comes to customer experience initiatives. However, to leverage the clear link between the CEO being in charge and company profitability and to pre-empt any future problems, brands should clear up any organisational ‘grey’ areas when it comes to customer experience transformation initiatives and put the CEO in charge.
This post was originally published on my Forbes.com column here.
6 Comments
Adrian, I suspect two things:
1. If everybody thinks they are in charge then nobody is.
2. If people don’t think the CEO is in charge then he probably isn’t.
Either which way it doesn’t look like a recipe for success to me.
A simple point well made
Thank you, James
Interesting study and findings, Adrian. I guess another thing that needs to be cleared up is what is meant by “in charge.” Your point about the CEO being in charge of everything that happens within the company is spot on. And yet, I’m thinking along the lines of, if the CEO’s not committed to the cause, no one else can be in charge either.
Annette 🙂
That’s a great point and one someone else has made too. Does the CEO need to actually be involved day to day? Maybe not. But, does he need to fund, sponsor, support and get behind the initiative? Absolutely.
So, I guess the answer behind what we mean by being ‘in charge’ will depend on the nature and size of the organisation.
Adrian
Every department in an organization plays a role in customer experience in some capacity. But you make a good point about who “owns” it. The overall strategy needs to come from one place to ensure it’s streamlined.
Hi Jeanne,
That’s a great point.
Adrian