Creating a customer-centric culture in contact centers requires more than just good intentions; it demands a strategic shift and unwavering leadership commitment. Fostering a culture of empathy, empowerment, and understanding that places the customer at the center of everything you do must be intentional and deliberate. It must be intertwined and woven into the values, mission, and pillars that create the roadmap identifying what a company’s true north is.
Cultivating a customer centric contact center starts from the top and requires leadership to lead by example. Living by customer centric values and visibility in supporting interactions with customers are essential for leaders to model for their people. The behaviors demonstrated by the leadership team set the tone for the entire organization and demonstrates what good customer experiences should look like. By prioritizing customer needs and empowering their teams, leaders can drive improvements in customer satisfaction and loyalty as well as promote a culture that places the customer at the center of everything they do.
Customer expectations, in conjunction with the company’s strategic goals, help set the performance standards that a customer-first culture is based upon. Reinforcing this culture requires leaders to create departmental and associate goals and objectives that not only support positive customer experiences, but also recognizes and rewards these behaviors when they are demonstrated.
Employee morale and the customer experience are intertwined. Organizations that value exceptional client experiences recognize they must promote positive employee morale and create a sense of purpose that is aligned with the work they do. The happier employees are, the more motivated they are to promote positive customer interactions because they feel valued and care about the organization they work for. Establishing processes and goals that demonstrate leadership prioritizes both the needs and experiences of their people, and their customers, are key to creating a culture that embraces customer satisfaction prioritization.
So how can leaders ensure that they are setting the proper example for their people outside of leading by example?
The following are just a few strategies that have been put in place by leadership within companies that prioritize fostering customer centric cultures:
Defining Clear Goals and Leveraging Customer Feedback:
- Demonstrate and articulate goals to define what exceptional customer experiences should look like.
- Embed customer experience standards, like Customer Satisfaction Scores (CSAT) and Net Promoter Scores (NPS), into conversations so that everyone understands their importance and what impacts these standards both positively and negatively.
- Set customer experience and satisfaction targets to promote accountability at all levels within the company.
- Ensure that a mechanism is in place to gather Voice of the Customer (VOC), and that the data is analyzed and reviewed to identify strengths and opportunities for improving customer satisfaction. Be sure to communicate and share these findings throughout the organization.
Empower Associates by Investing in Learning
- Ensure that training standards not only emphasize the importance of the customer experience, but also empowers them with the tools to promote these experiences themselves.
- Provide opportunities for development that support customer service skills to promote empathy, patience, problem resolution, and understanding the human need versus the business need.
- Create consistent opportunities for enhancing skills that are tailored to each associate’s strengths and areas of opportunity to ensure that training and coaching development opportunities are not one size fits all.
- Empower associates to be engaged in their own development by having them identify areas in which they are confident in their skills and areas in which they would like more coaching, training, or education.
Reward Behaviors and Outcomes Through Aligned Incentives
- Celebrate the wins! When someone is demonstrating customer centric behaviors, create opportunities to privately and publicly celebrate.
- Link performance metrics that align with customer experience goals to incentives that reward those that go above and beyond.
- Create recognition programs that are employee driven that motivate others to reinforce the organization’s commitment to both employee and customer centricity.
- Provide opportunities for associates that excel and are recognized as role models to coach and mentor others so that they can share their expertise, to promote peer to peer support, and to create leadership pipelines.
Wherever you are in your journey towards creating a culture of customer centricity within your organization, always remember to lead by example. Leadership plays a crucial role in the process and sets the tone for the entire organization. Evaluating whether your leadership team is empowered to engage, set goals, and implement strategies that prioritize customer satisfaction will create a starting point when assessing your current landscape. Creating a culture that defines, empowers, and rewards for modeling customer centric behaviors and outcomes provides accountability and incentives for going above and beyond. Allow leaders to do what they do best, transform culture to help drive the change you want to see one customer experience at a time.
Susan’s career progression over the past 25+ years from a front-line processor and call center representative to Chief Customer Officer has been a profound and rewarding learning experience. Her innovative approach to contact center operations and relationship management has redefined the importance of the customer experience at Slavic401k. By consistently placing the customer at the heart of every decision, Susan has fostered a culture of empathy, accountability, and excellence, achieving outstanding results for both the business and the customers they serve.
