AUTHOR ARCHIVES: Bill Pollock

Strategies for Growth^SM  President and member of the #FSN20 Bill Pollock takes a look at what separates great customer service and good customer service....

Conceptually, the main difference between providing “good” customer service and delivering “great” customer service is that, in the former, you are probably only barely keeping your customers satisfied; while in the latter, you are not only keeping them satisfied – you are also keeping them loyal! This is a very important distinction – and one that many services providers do not always “get”.

For example, let’s say that, historically, your company – and you, as one of its personal “ambassadors” – have been working very hard to keep your customers happy.

You have striven to respond to all of their calls in a timely basis; you have arrived at their site within the contracted time in nearly all cases; you have carried the right parts with you to the service call (or have been able to obtain them as quickly as possible once the need has been identified); and you have followed up with a courtesy call whenever there has been time (and even when there has not).

 

While you may think that the sum of these activities, in and of itself, represents “superior” customer service on behalf of you and the company, some of your customers may think otherwise.

They are more likely to feel that all of these services are to be expected from their services providers – all of the time! In fact, you probably have more customers than not who think these activities constitute nothing more than “average” customer service and support, and not “great” support – and guess what? They might be right!

The companies that are generally acknowledged to be providers of “great”, rather than merely “good”, service are those that typically go the “extra mile” in the way they treat their customers.

This may include doing simple things like calling with an Estimated Time of Arrival (i.e., ETA) when they are approaching the limits of their normal on-site response times, or following-up after a service call to explain why an equipment failure may have occurred in the first place, and how to possibly avoid it from happening again in the future.

Thus, it may be that the only perceived difference between “good” and “great” customer service on the customer’s part is the way in which their service providers regularly communicate with them!

 

It is important to keep the customer “in the loop” at all times. If they are expecting you to arrive on-site to perform a repair, they also expect to know approximately when you will actually get there. If there is a problem with your arriving as scheduled, they’ll want to know as soon as possible when you will get there – they will not want any surprises!

It all becomes a matter of “ownership”; if the customer has to call you to find out where you are, when you’re going to be arriving on-site, or how long you think the machine will be down, the customer “owns” the service call.

However, if you can call the customer in advance with an ETA and, at the same time, provide him or her with some accompanying information, you “own” the call. And if you “own” the call, you also “own” the power to keep the customer informed, in line, and, ultimately, satisfied.

Service providers that merely offer “good” customer service are probably doing virtually all of the same things that those providing “great” customer service are doing. However, the single most important thing that distinguishes the “great” providers from the “good” providers, is that they also communicate better with their customers.

When the customer is happy because of you, they are more likely to stay happy with you.

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The services sector has traditionally been guided by a succession of rules, regulations and policies that, hopefully, make us all better at supporting our customers and the global business economy, as a whole argues Strategies For Growth℠’s (SFG℠) President, Bill Pollock...

Many of these guidelines mirror other aspects of our lives as well, such as “Mind your Manners”, “Mind your Own Business” and – of course, “Mind the Gap!” However, no guideline may be as important to the services community as “Mind the Metrics” – and this is particularly well evidenced in the UK & EMEA geographies.

In fact, a special cut of the results from Strategies For Growth℠’s (SFG℠) 2014 Field Service Management Benchmark Survey reveal that, for the UK/EMEA services community, “developing/improving the metrics, or KPIs, used to measure Field Service Performance” is the number one strategic action currently being taken, as cited by nearly two-thirds (i.e., 64%) of survey respondents (Figure 1). No other strategic actions are cited by as many as half of respondents, although “investing in mobile tools to support field technicians” rates fairly high at 49%, followed by “improving planning and forecasting with respect to field service operations” at just over one-third (i.e., 34%).

This is no surprise to Steve Alderson, Managing Director at Cognito, a leading, UK-based provider of mobile workforce management solutions to field service organisations, who corroborates that “This exactly reflects what we are hearing from the industry with service organisations facing intense pressure from competitors and rising customer expectations. These survey results confirm the strong sense in the market that getting a better understanding of field service metrics is critical to improving overall performance.”

The primary Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), or metrics, currently being used by a majority of UK/EMEA Field Services Organisations (FSOs) include:

• 78% Customer Satisfaction
• 75% Total Service Revenue/Turnover
• 68% Total Service Cost
• 53% Field Technician Utilisation (i.e., time spent performing repairs ÷ total hours)
• 53% Percent of Total Service Revenue under Service Level Agreement (SLA)
• 51% Service Revenue, as a Percent of Total Company Revenues
• 51% Service Revenue, per Field Technician

It is interesting to note, however, that most of the primary KPIs that were being used when many of us were just breaking into the business, while still important, are typically only used today by a minority of services organisations (i.e., on-site response time and first-time-fix-rate, each cited by 49%; SLA compliance and mean-time-to-repair/MTTR, each cited by 47%; and several others). However, what the data do not show is a diminution of importance among the old ‘tried and true’ KPIs, but, rather, an increased emphasis among those factors that are most influential today with respect to customer satisfaction, field tech utilisation and – oh, yes – the bottom line!

Most services industry analysts would also agree that you cannot – and should not – merely collect and tabulate the data – that is basically what a market research analyst firm does. Running a services organisation, however, is quite different, according to Alderson who suggests that, “Information without action is useless”. He continues, “As service organisations mature, and implement the next generation of mobile workforce management systems, sophisticated data gathering and analytical capabilities will be mandatory. However, the ability to act on the insights and knowledge gained, to improve field service performance, will be the key to thriving, not just surviving.”

But, why are KPIs so important to the overall well-being of the organisation? Because, for many, their service performance goals are simply not being met! For example, in the UK/EMEA services community:

• 32% of FSOs are not attaining at least 80% Customer Satisfaction

  (UK/EMEA average is 82% Customer Satisfaction)

• 28% of FSOs are not attaining at least 80% SLA Compliance

  (UK/EMEA average is 81% SLA Compliance)

•  26% of FSOs are not achieving at least 20% services profitability

  (UK/EMEA average is 35% Services Profitability)

For these reasons alone, between a quarter and a third (or more) of the UK/EMEA FSOs probably find themselves in the need for new and/or upgraded mobile workforce management technologies to run their organisations. Then, of course, they’ll still need to measure their performance along the way. It’s definitely time to “Mind the Metrics!”

Bill Pollock, President and Principal Consulting Analyst with Strategies for GrowthSM takes an alternative look at ensuring your mobile workforce is well resourced throughout all seasons...

“The world of work has changed,” according to Jeffrey Leventhal, CEO and co-founder of Work Market, a leading platform and marketplace for finding and managing freelance labor. And this may be especially true for the services industry, where simply doing things the same way they’ve always been done just doesn’t cut it anymore.

However, Leventhal also warns that, “finding the right talent is one of the primary challenges in building an on-demand workforce. Especially for companies who use freelancers at scale, it’s imperative to find a reliable place where you can routinely tap into top-tier freelancers.” For the services industry, top tier typically means highly trained – and in many cases, certified – field technicians that may be confidently dispatched shortly after being recruited and vetted by the organisation. Oh, yeah – and they must also be conveniently located proximate to a wide distribution of customer sites.

How can this be done? And what are the potential pitfalls of not having a well thought out plan for action, or not employing the proper tools to support an expanding market demand? Well, … unfortunately, there are many potential stumbling blocks – unless the plan is built on a foundation structured upon an effective onsite freelancer platform.

According to Diego Lomanto, vice president of marketing for Work Market, “there are six tools, or processes, that a services organisation requires in order to effectively manage its field technician freelancers. They are find, verify, engage, manage, pay and rate.” Each of these tools may be described as follows:

Find

Identifying and finding the right freelancers for the job at hand represents the best place to start. For many businesses, it is relatively easy to screen lists of potential freelancers in easily defined industry segments, such as accountants, home healthcare aides, plumbers and electricians, etc., by relying on any one of a number of widely used list sources such as Craigslist, the Better Business Bureau (BBB), LinkedIn or Google, etc. However, in the services community, most of these list sources will often come up short.

However, an onsite freelancer platform, such as that offered by Work Market, can handle things much more efficiently by providing a tool that:

• Allows the user to build assignments quickly, based on previous work,
• Identifies candidates that best meet the required skill sets, and
• Provides a mechanism for generating and tracking community ratings for each selected candidate (i.e., to assure a consistent level of freelancer quality)

Verify

The verification of the required skill sets represents another major obstacle for most services organisations in terms of their ability to check out the candidate’s background and capabilities, as they relate specifically to field service. In other words, do they have the right stuff – stuff meaning skills, experience and certifications, among others?

The use of an effective onsite freelancer platform takes nearly all of the burden out of the verification process by allowing the user to:

• Verify the candidate’s credentials via an integrated verification process; and
• Identify limit functions which, in turn, will automatically off-board the independent contractor when compliance thresholds are reached, or if certain details change, (i.e., such as expiring insurance coverage or certifications, etc.).

Engage

The engagement process is typically where too many organisation begin the process, as it is typically far less painstaking for some to start with the recruitment of “warm bodies”, rather than mounting a concerted effort upfront to find the most qualified candidates – and be able to verify that they are, in fact, eminently qualified for the job.

This is where an onsite freelancer platform provides, perhaps, one of its greatest value propositions to its users, by allowing them to:

• Organise their field technician workforce into groups for easy assignment en masse; and
• Eliminate the need for having to deal with only one contractor at a time, or conversely, having to rely on group e-mails that make it impossible to manage responses quickly or effectively.

Manage

Managing the freelancer field force should require the greatest levels of attention and oversight by the organisation; however, many managers find themselves too overwhelmed and/or understaffed to effectively handle the situation. Nonetheless, this is often the single process that ultimately defines the direction – and the success – of the organisation in terms of its ability to send the best qualified people to each site, and track their performance and progress over time. Many services organisations utilise fully functioning mobile applications to communicate with their mobile field force in real time – but this may not be enough!

By utilising an onsite freelancer platform, users benefit from a variety of tools that allow for:

• All field communications and management tools to be resident in a single system
• The use of geo-location tools to identify the exact locations of their freelance contractors in real time, and
• The ability of workers to upload and complete all tasks directly through their mobile devices.

Pay

Paying the organisation’s mobile field force freelancers should be one of the easiest jobs to do – but any HR or accounts payable professional will likely tell you different. What should typically only involve the tracking of hours, and cutting checks to the appropriate individuals is generally anything but easy – and PayPal simply doesn’t cut it!

What can make this process as easy as it gets is the ability of the onsite freelancer platform to empower the organisation to:

• Allow for Application Programming Interface (API) integration into existing payment platforms so they can continue to manage their respective accounting processes all in one place, and on a business-as-usual basis; and
• Create a robust mechanism for reporting key financial and compliance data to HR, Accounting – and the CFO – as necessary.

Rate

However, the series of processes does not end once the freelancer is paid, and the transaction is reported. In fact, the process is never-ending – and cyclical – in that the performance of each and every freelancer is rated, tracked and ranked to identify top talent for future projects, and measure the performance of the onsite freelancer model as a whole, over time. It can also be well argued that the organisation will likely have greater confidence in the ratings provided directly by their customers (and/or, their territory managers) rather than by an outside third party, such as Angie’s List or the Better Business Bureau (BBB), etc.

Therefore, the principal benefits of an onsite freelancer platform are that it provides users with:

• An online capability for rating, and viewing ratings, on a much broader scale, and
• The ability to determine the “height of the bar” with regard to the desired, or expected, quality of the worker’s performance.

Coordinating all of these individual tools into a single set of processes may be daunting for many organisations – but not so much when they have the power of an effective onsite freelancer platform such as that offered by Work Market, at their disposal. It is difficult enough to run a services organisation (or any business, for that matter) in general – but it is far more difficult to attempt to do so without the support of the proper technology, tools and processes.

[To download a complimentary whitepaper on “Finding & Managing Onsite Freelancers” for businesses and field service organisations click here]

Customer requirements for field service and customer support will never be the same from one country to another, any more than they will be the same from one customer to another. However, one thing remains very clear – the requirements for service are becoming increasingly standardised, even on a global basis. Bill Pollock President of  Strategies For Growth^SM explains more...

The above is particularly true as more and more local services organisations are going regional, regional organisations are going national, and national organisations are going international in terms of their sales, marketing and global services capabilities.

Just a few years ago, only the largest services organisations had credible worldwide global service and support portfolios. However, today, mainly through the proliferation of Cloud-based technologies; Internet, tablet and social media tools; and the increasing use of strategic alliance partners, even the small and medium-sized services organisations are finding themselves empowered to support their customers on a global basis.

Still, the perceptions of what it might take to be a “world class” global services provider remain inconsistent even among some of the most sophisticated vendors. However, regardless of each individual organisation’s approach or perceptions, it can safely be said that services requirements are both every bit the same, and every bit different, in each corner of the globe.

Further, many services providers in the United States have discovered over the past several years that there is more than one language spoken in global service. This was a lesson learned years earlier by most European and Asian providers trying to break into the U.S. market, as well as by Canadian services organisations that have been dealing with bilingual support (i.e., Canadian English and Canadian French) for decades. However, the globalisation of service and support refers to much more than simply language differences – it must also focus on the cultural, economic and business differences that are manifested in varying forms all over the world.

 

As most individual businesses continue to grow larger, and larger businesses continue to acquire, merge and consolidate, there will be increasing pressure on global services providers to grow along with their customers’ needs for a broader and more sophisticated range of services – both in terms of breadth and scope (e.g., a full array of professional services in addition to traditional break/fix and help desk support, etc.) and geographic coverage (e.g., cross-border capabilities).

The conventional wisdom is that some of the services providers that presently offer very high levels of service and support, but only among the basic, or “core”, types of services, or only in a limited geographic area, may actually end up losing out to other, less high performing providers that offer a wider array of services over a larger geographic (i.e., global) area.

The general rule of thumb among customers is often, “why settle for varying or erratic levels of service and support over the whole of our enterprise by relying on the use of multiple vendors, when we can ensure a more standardised mode of delivery – all at satisfactory levels – provided across our entire system?”

While the former mode of service delivery may range from “excellent” to “average” depending on the type of service provided, or the location of the end user, the latter mode generally assures that, at least, there will be consistent levels of service provided enterprise-wide – i.e., with no geo-by-geo “surprises”.

In today’s services environment, the true measure of a provider’s ability to adapt to its marketplace is no longer answered strictly in terms of how well it can deliver different types of support to different types of customers, but in how well it can provide desired levels of service and support to each of its customers, regardless of their size, industry segment or geographical location.

As such, the word “global” should no longer simply conjure up images of field technicians trudging through the wilds of the Great Australian Outback, or cross-country skiing to a remote IT site through a harsh Canadian winter terrain (although this may also be the case from time to time), nor should it be interpreted solely as fostering a company mentality of trying to be “all things to all parties”.

Rather, “global” should be defined as “offering the full complement of desired services and support, either directly or through strategic services partnerships, to support the full enterprise-wide needs of the customer.”

It has taken the services industry the last century to get to the point to where it is today. However, it will be around this definition of “global service" and support that the future of the industry will likely be based. Where it will ultimately take us will, as always, be heavily dependent on how the services marketplace believes its providers are responding to its “global” needs.

In any number of forums, ranging from trade shows and conferences, to workshops, seminars and general consulting assignments, we are often asked the question: “What do Best Practices services organisations do differently from all others in order to attain that status?” The way we like to answer that question is with an explanation of why “less isn’t always more!”

In business – as in life itself – the best way of operating generally revolves around the concept of “less is more.” And, in most circumstances, this philosophy typically holds true. For example, less costs incurred with respect to operating a service center would certainly be a desired goal – as would less customer complaints, less customer system downtime, less technician time spent at the customer site, and so on.

However, Best Practices services organisations have learned, typically through experience, how to discern when a “less is more” approach is required, and when a “more is better” approach would be more desirable. There is a true distinction, and one that the Best Practices organisations have found they can literally “take to the bank!”

[quote]“Best Practices organisations have already learned that the best way to justify an investment is to measure how your performance has improved as a result.”

 

From research conducted over the past year, a number of factors stand out that truly differentiate Best Practices organisations from the general population. Contrary to conventional wisdom, Best Practices organisations do not necessarily face a different set of challenges than all others – they just deal with them more effectively. They don’t necessarily embark on a differing set of strategic actions than all others – they just apply more emphasis on some than they do on others. And they don’t necessarily utilise differing technologies and applications than all others – they just use them more pervasively and effectively.

Of course, it is not really just that simple. There is no doubt that Best Practices organisations generally have more resources available at their disposal than most others, and that they know how to use them better. But the story is actually much more complex than what may initially meet the eye. Let me explain …

First, most Best Practices organisations have already dealt with – and mostly successfully – the need to cut costs over the past several years. In addition, they have also taken steps to drive increased service revenues in the most recent timeframe. This is not to say that they have cut ALL costs, or that ALL potential revenue streams have been successfully cultivated; but, rather, that these issues are now fairly well under control among the leading organisations (i.e., as opposed to all others, many of which are still addressing these two issues as their number one and number two challenges). The advantage that Best Practices organisations have, as a result, is that they can focus more on other key strategic and tactical actions that will assure they stay ahead of the pack for some time to come.

Some examples of the primary means by which Best Practices organisations have dealt with cutting costs may include areas such as (1) restructuring the services organisation; (2) streamlining primary services processes, policies and procedures; (3) automating historically manual tasks and activities; and the like.

Examples of some of the more common means by which they may have driven increased service revenues include (1) implementation of a formal warranty and contract management solution; (2) deployment of mobile tools in support of the field force (e.g., to capture signatures and submit invoices at the customer site, etc.); (3) move toward the increased use of real-time data collection and exchange; etc.

Perhaps the greatest differentiator between Best Practices and all other services organisations is the following: Best Practices organisations typically know when they need to do “less”; and when they need to do “more.” However, the one key area where they are truly doing the “most” to maintain their status of Best Practices, is with respect to performance measurement.

In fact, Best Practices organisations are 20% more likely to utilise a formal set of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to measure their service operations and delivery performance than all others. In addition, they are also using up to a dozen – or more – targeted KPIs to routinely measure critical performance areas, and report the results – often in real time – to all relevant stakeholders (i.e., those on a “need to know” basis).

This is clearly an area where “more” is better than “less,” and one where Best Practices organisations have already learned that the best way to justify an investment is to measure how your performance has improved as a result.

For a more detailed analysis of what differentiates Best Practices organisations from all others, we invite you to download our White Paper entitled, “Best Practices Organisations Plan to Invest More – and Measure More – in 2014”, available through Field Services News here

Strategies for Growth's President, and member of the Field Service News advisory panel, Bill Pollock takes a look at how he believes the industry will fare in the coming year...

All things point to 2014 as being the year when “Back to the Basics” and “Back to the Future” are finally due to collide. The collision will not be spontaneous – nor will it be particularly disruptive. In fact, it is likely to be extremely synergistic! Moreover, our research strongly suggests that these two otherwise divergent paths will begin to work together in a more harmonious manner to propel the global services community to even greater heights with respect to both revenue growth and profitability.

Granted, similar statements are made around this time each year (some, even, by myself); however, 2014 will be a markedly different year in that there has already been a steady uptick in new technology investment evidenced over the past 12 - 18 months (i.e., supporting the “future”), coupled with a renewed appreciation that customer needs and expectations must once again be placed at the top of the list of market strategies and actions that can empower services organisations to attain higher levels of service performance, customer satisfaction and profitability (i.e., the “basics”).

Let me explain how these two paths are most likely to collide …

“Back to the Basics”

Immediately following the “great” global economic meltdown of several years ago, most services organisations almost immediately went into cost-cutting mode in an attempt to reign in expenses (both capital and operating). While some employed an orchestrated approach to cost-cutting, others may have gone somewhat overboard or, even worse, may have ended up not having cut enough waste or inefficiencies in a timely enough manner. Nonetheless, over several years, most of the leading (i.e., “best practices”) services organisations were finally able to rollback costs to a point where they were able to not only survive, but thrive in a downturned global economy.

However, as it became increasingly evident that costs could not be cut any lower (i.e., nothing more to cut!), many organisations found themselves struggling to maintain – let alone bolster – their respective bottom lines. Once again, the leading organizations recognised that the bottom line was actually an equation, influenced directly by both costs and revenues (among numerous other factors). Therefore, if they could not decrease the cost side of the equation any longer, the best way to improve the bottom line would be to drive higher levels of service revenues. Thus began a brief era (i.e., two to three years or so) that transitioned the focus from cost-cutting to revenue generation.

Fast forward to 2014, and we are now seeing a global services community that has much of its costs under control, has taken proactive and interactive steps to drive increased levels of service revenues, and has allowed itself (gratefully) to re-focus its resources on the needs and expectations of the customer – a return to a more classic approach to services strategies and actions.

“Back to the Future”

However, it seems that each year, new technologies, applications, tools and “toys” are forecasted to “change the way in which we live” – or, for the services community, “the way in which we will be able to manage our operations.” Some prime examples have included such diverse technologies and tools as Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) and tablets, RFIDs and scanners, M2M and remote monitoring, the Segway – and the list goes on and on. Then we all take a collective deep breath, wait a few years, and – sometimes, before we even are fully aware, they quietly become integral components of both our lives and our businesses. (Well, maybe not so much with respect to the Segway!)

Fortunately (albeit mainly for those organizations that have already prepared themselves for dealing with the “basics”), the “future” is about to collide with them – but in a good way. For example, earlier this year, it was reported that a fighter jet used by the United Kingdom’s Royal Air Force (RAF) flew with 3-D printed metal components for the first time. The air intake support struts, protective guards for take-off shafts and cockpit radio covers inside the Tornado jet were all made by 3-D metal printing, said defense manufacturer BAE Systems.

In October 2013, U.S. defense contractor Lockheed Martin said it was experimenting with 3-D printing of titanium parts for use in space flight; and NASA has plans to put a 3-D printer on the International Space Station later this year. Although 3-D printers can cost several hundred dollars or more, the question remains, how much can your organization save by 3-D printing some of its more common, fairly basic, parts?

M2M technology; big data; real-time telematics; and new mobile devices, applications and tools are being introduced to the global services landscape on a seemingly weekly basis, and – oh, yes, before you know it, many of 2013’s, 2012’s or (plug in the year) “new” technologies that may have mysteriously fallen off of our radar screens, may actually find their ways into our services organisations’ regular operating routines, thereby supporting the transition of this year’ “future” to next year’s “basics.

Enjoy the transition – and don’t forget to “mind the collision!”