Be Different or be dead

July 28, 2010

16 surprising actions to take that you won’t know are strategic

Source: Pexels

16 surprising actions to take that you won’t know are strategic.

Normally, ‘strategic acts’ in any business plan are thought of to be complicated and theoretically driven; that they are authored by people with impressive academic credentials and a rift of letters behind their name.

Not true. in my experience strategic acts are driven by simple behaviours because they deliver results rather than looking awesome on paper.

In no particular order…

1. Recruit people who genuinely ‘love’ human beings. Yes, liking other people is strategic!

2. Take notes. It’s an expression of the fact that someone cares enough about what you are saying to record it for further deliberation and ACTION.

3. Do stuff. Action gets results, thinking takes the number two position.

4. Apologize when things are screwed up. Recovery depends on assuming responsibility for what has happened. ’ am truly sorry’ starts off the loyalty building process the right way regardless of whether it was your fault or not.

5. Cut the CRAP in the organization that is no longer relevant AND that clogs the wheels of progress (Tom Peters’ call it the GRUNGE - awesome word!).

6. Over-react when a customer is screwed over. over reaction to a service mistake is a strategic act.
Again, successful recovery demands speed to get things right.

7. Problem solve. Things never go right the first time. SH*T Happen. Solutions are needed.

8. Form cross-functional teams. Results are produced across the organization demanding people working together harmoniously.

9. Tell stories. It’s a vital element of strategy. The best way of explaining to someone what the strategy means is to tell a story about it in action.

10. Use internal report cards to measure service quality on the inside of the organization. If internal customers aren’t dazzled it is highly unlikely (no, impossible) that external ones are.

11. Recognize service heroes constantly.

12. Encourage employees to successfully fail. A successful failure results in learning which advances the organization. An unacceptable failure has no learning element and simply destroys value.

13. Practice leadership by serving around is rampant across the organization.

14. Gather customer secrets. They are the fuel that powers your marketing and service machine.

15. Change your business language to be more customer-centric.

Wash your mouth out with customers

16. Get feedback on your performance from your boss, peers and direct reports 360 feedback.

Are you practising these?

If not, start the journey…

Cheers,
Roy
Check out my BE DiFFERENT or be dead Book Series

• Posted 7.28.10 at 01:00 pm by Roy Osing
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July 26, 2010

Why an executive leader is necessary to support customers

Source: Unsplash

Why an executive leader is necessary to support customers.

The “Chief” designation is well used in organizations these days: Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer, and Chief Marketing Officer are but a few positions that carry this prestigious tag.

The serving side of a business (some call it the service side) gets short shrift however.

Very few companies have established a Chief of this side of the business.

The CSO — Chief Serving Officer — must in my view be established in any organization who has a strategy to acquire and retain loyal customers

This is a huge mistake! If serving is a critical component of your strategy you need single finger accountability to a senior executive for the flawless delivery of both coire service and dazzling customer experiences.

Diluting the responsibility across the organization will simply not work. It won’t get the attention required. Nor the focus. It requires a champion who can sit in executive team meetings and hammer the table when actions in the organization are preventing raving customer fans from being secured.

Here’s the CSO position description:

▪️ Create and execute the service strategy of the organization.&

▪️ Re-engineer customer serving processes from the customer’s point of view.

▪️ Develop the ABSOLUTELY-MUST-HAVE-WILL-TAKE-NOTHING-LESS competencies of frontline positions.

▪️ Define the recruitment process to be used in bringing on Customer Servers.

▪️ Get the value of the frontline leader position re-valued in the organization to be THE MOST STRATEGIC POSITION EVER.

▪️ Be the ultimate guardian of customer moments of truth. Watch them. Evaluate them. Improve them. Coach. Coach. Coach.

▪️ Kill dumb rules - the internal rules and policies that infuriate customers.

▪️ Set up dumb rules committees throughout the organization to seek out and cleanse the internal environment of stuff that makes no sense to customers.

▪️ Be THE advocate for the frontline. Protect them. Nurture them. Celebrate with them. Help them. Be the do-whatever-it-takes person to make sure they can delight customers.

▪️ Set up customer feedback panels to hear the truth about how you serve them. Get the CEO involved as well. The entire executive team. Leaders need to hear how your serving is perceived.

▪️ Assume the role of Chief Storytelling Officer. Get out in front of people with stories that breathe life in the service strategy.

▪️ Pay homage to service heroes. Know who they are and the names of their kids.

These are strategic acts that must be performed to stand-out in the way you serve your customers.

Put a CSO in place to make it happen.

Cheers,
Roy
Check out my BE DiFFERENT or be dead Book Series

• Posted 7.26.10 at 12:00 pm by Roy Osing
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June 14, 2010

1 easy way to describe your unique competitive position

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1 easy way to describe your unique competitive position.

It is critical that organizations declare their competitive position in the market in simple, clear and compelling terms.

The fact is, most don’t do it very well. They use vague words and phrases like ‘best’, ‘number one’ and ‘leader’ to describe the differential advantage they believe they have in the market. Words like these do little to give a prospective buyer reasons to do business from them as opposed to others.

Seth Godin says “If you can’t describe your position in 8 words or less, you don’t have a position.”

I agree that a positioning statement is critical, but I think we need to be a little clearer in terms of the competitive element. I would amend Seth’s statement to read “If you can’t define your unique position in 8 words or less, you don’t have a position.”

An 8-word positioning statement that doesn’t deal with how you are unique among your competitors won’t have any impact at all

Winning and survival demands that organizations create unique value differences between themselves and their competitors.

Failure to do so gives customers no compelling reason to do business with them as opposed to others with a predictable end result.

The ONLY Statement is a way to crystallize your uniqueness; it captures the essence of your business plan in terms of how you intend to differentiate your organization from your competitors.

This claim is the ultimate manifestation of differentiation, a rallying cry for the organization and the guiding light for all marketing communications activity.

Complete the sentence: “We are the ONLY ones that…” and you have a positioning statement that works.

Example of an ONLY statement..

MUG Solutions of Vancouver, Canada:

“We provide the only permanent solution that prevents biohazard contaminants (such as used syringes) and all other debris from entering manholes.”

Cheers,
Roy
Check out my BE DiFFERENT or be dead Book Series

• Posted 6.14.10 at 01:00 pm by Roy Osing
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April 10, 2010

How cost cutting can be done without losing customers

Source: Pexels

How cost cutting can be done without losing customers.

When operating margins get squeezed, organizations go on a cost cutting rampage often without reflection on their strategy. This approach is a disaster waiting to happen.

Here are some guidelines for collapsing your cost envelope without being sorry later for your actions:

1. Avoid considering activities that impact how you serve customers — Customer serving functions and people are definitely NOT in the ‘low hanging fruit’ category.

2. Examine quick hit opportunities to simplify business processes — Cut out unnecessary steps that impair effectiveness. Less complex processes will drive expenses down.

3. Eliminate layers in your organization that ‘manage’ and do not directly contribute to the output of the organization.

4. Throw out low value-add positions— Any ‘or’ jobs such as ‘co-ordinator’, ‘administrator’, and ‘facilitator’ should be considered for elimination. You need doers not people who work with the output of others.

5. Cut the crap — Anything that does not directly serve the strategy of the organization should be hacked. This is essential in good times; it is critical in challenging times. Training programs, for example, that don’t support the strategy (customer service, marketing and sales) directly should be stopped.

6. Look at temporary positions— Consider keeping only those that are in the serving customers value chain.

7. Mass media advertising.— Should be eliminated in favor of targeted “me marketing” programs.

Incent your leaders to remove non-strategic costs. Change the bonus compensation plan to make it matter for all of them.

Cheers,
Roy
Check out my BE DiFFERENT or be dead Book Series

• Posted 4.10.10 at 01:00 pm by Roy Osing
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