The following article originally appeared on MyCustomer.com
What is the definition of success for colleagues in other departments, and how can customer experience professionals help them succeed?
Why does working in CX sometimes feel like a thankless task? We bust a gut to improve customer experience. We deliver business results that engage employees and support the long-term prospects of our businesses.
And there lies the problem. We see CX as the best - if not the only - way of ensuring repeat customers and advocacy. But that go
al is not what gets our colleagues out of bed. It isn't what they trained for. It isn't what the business pays them to achieve.
To influence our colleagues, we need to think about them as we think about customers. That is, as individuals with jobs-to-be-done, emotions and passions we may never understand, but need to respect.
I am the executive editor of a series of monographs written by CX professionals and published by the CXPA. I have a cross-functional background and know successful change only happens when we engage and motivate stakeholders.
To write our monographs we asked: "What is our colleagues’ definition of business success and how can CX professionals help them succeed?". Here are some answers.
Finance
What is their definition of success?
Finance professionals maximise profits and drive sustainable growth.
How can customer experience leaders help them to succeed?
We can help them by proving - in their terms - CX does the same. We can build business cases for projects and link CX metrics to business performance. Many finance professionals will help us with both as it helps them.
Operations
What is their definition of success?
Operations delivers business goals. Its key measures include resource management, cost, quality and delivery. Often, it sets targets to meet promises made to customers.
How can customer experience leaders help them to succeed?
We can help it enhance efficiencies and meet customer needs. Trying to improve CX without making operational improvements disengages a vital stakeholder group.
Marketing
What is their definition of success?
Marketing makes connections between customers and the brand to obtain qualified leads. Its measures of success and the tools it uses are constantly evolving. Some of this evolution looks like customer experience management. But we must remember the differences in our objectives.
How can customer experience leaders help them to succeed?
CX helps marketing by ensuring brand promise reflects experience. We bring customer needs and perceptions to the table and enrich customer data.
Customer service
What is their definition of success?
Customer service shares key metrics with CX. But it has a staggering range of performance metrics, such as the number of open tickets.
How can customer experience leaders help them to succeed?
We can help by amplifying the voice of the customer services. By preventing issues through the design of robust customer journeys, we reduce the number of calls. We also influence the emotions and intensity of feelings customers pass onto employees. By achieving our goals, we help customer services act with more empathy.
C-Suite
What is their definition of success?
The balanced scorecard helps us understand the c-suite's definition of success. In it, we can see the c-suite focus on finance, employees, internal process and customers.
How can customer experience leaders help them to succeed?
The strongest CX teams support all those subjects and consider the impact they have on each. When the CX team is an ally of the c-suite, it wins opportunities to invest in CX.
What is their definition of success?
These teams have a shared goal -- to sell more at a better price. The evolution of Sales, particularly through the customer success team, has moved the discipline closer to CX. We must embrace this and bring our unique skills to bear. These teams have a unique understanding of the customer. They hear objections and get first-hand insight into the reputation of the business.
How can customer experience leaders help them to succeed?
We can help our colleagues bring in new customers, retain customers and upsell / cross sell. We must listen and build a business case to stop CX weaknesses compromising the number and value of sales.
Information technology
What is their definition of success?
The IT department facilitates process introduction and change. It manages data and improves productivity. We can help it better understand customer needs and realise greater returns on investment.
How can customer experience leaders help them to succeed?
We can help it align systems, structures and data to enhance productivity. And we can inform reporting to improve the quality of decision-making.
Product development (product and service, physical and digital)
What is their definition of success?
Product development delivers the customers' primary job-to-be-done. Its experts are highly trained and focused on the technical aspects of design.
How can customer experience leaders help them to succeed?
We can help it humanise design inputs (requirements). In doing so we help develop better products and meet more customer needs.
Supply chain management
What is their definition of success?
On paper, the SCM team measures success by cost, quality and delivery. However, SCM is always driven to cost.
How can customer experience leaders help them to succeed?
We can address the balance by contributing to the total cost of supplied goods and services. We can also motivate the supply chain by sharing customer stories and engaging it in our work.
Business improvements (BI)
What is their definition of success?
The BI team delivers changes to meet the objectives of the c-suite.
How can customer experience leaders help them to succeed?
We can help by adopting a balanced approach to our projects, supporting the achievement of targets and informing the design of new ways of working.
HR
What is their definition of success?
The HR team ensures the business has the right number of people with the right skills and behaviours. It enables the delivery of business goals in a manner congruent with the vision and desired culture.
How can customer experience leaders help them to succeed?
We can support by nurturing the relationship between CX and EX.
What is their definition of success?
While data owners work across many disciplines, they have common responsibilities.
How can customer experience leaders help them to succeed?
We must work with other data owners to tell richer stories, resolve data incongruence and gaps, and create actionable insights. We must support work to integrate data sources and databases to ensure the quality of reporting and reduce costs.
Governance and sponsorship
Governance and sponsorship are tools developed to ensure the success of projects. Many businesses have strong governance and sponsors who understand their role. These businesses are better at all forms of business change. We wrote this monograph to help other businesses pick up these skills.
Michelle Spaul is an independent CX consultant with strong cross-functional and change experience and skills. The CXPA monograph series 'Effective Collaboration' is available as an online resource for all CXPA members and to purchase from www.cxbookstore.com.
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