Moving with your customer is important for success. The first requirement is to know what your customers want. Asking them regularly is then the obvious thing to do. If you know your customers very well, you can think of new products or services to surprise them with. You will also know which points for improvement are best tackled first. In doing so, you must always weigh up the costs and benefits. The stability and efficiency of your business operations are crucial when considering change. Customers become dissatisfied if they have to pay too much for or wait too long for your products or services.
How agile are the employees in your organisation?
Do you recognise yourself in one of these examples?
“‘Are there any suggestions for improvements?’ This is asked by everyone who has direct contact with the perfumeries and drugstores to which our company supplies beauty products. In addition, we regularly ask customers via the website to indicate what they think of our services. This data is discussed every week in the weekly meetings of all our teams. We first consider what customers think is positive about our services. Then we look at the suggestions for improvement. If it is something we can easily change as a team, we implement it immediately. Issues that we cannot solve ourselves are passed on. Sometimes we need to look deeper into the cause of a complaint. A few team members then investigate and come up with possible solutions the following week. Customer satisfaction is very high by working this way. We also work with great pleasure, because we know what we are doing it for.”
“I am a DJ at a radio station. I like to play a lot of jingles and sounds in between. I also talk to listeners and like to make jokes. Recently, the listening figures of my programme went down. We did a survey among listeners. Most of them thought that comparatively too little music was being played. I took that to heart, which led to positive reactions and improved listening figures.”
“I work as a saleswoman in a clothes shop. We are instructed to say that all the clothes that a customer tries on look very good. This is to boost sales. My sales figures were not great. I caught myself not really looking at customers, because I always had to say the same thing. And that affected my motivation, even though I really love this job. I suggested trying it differently for a month. Now, if a customer comes in and is open to advice, I tell them honestly what I think and suggest alternatives. My sales figures have soared because I now often sell combinations rather than single items. There are also customers who come back and ask for me. My working method has been adopted by all my colleagues.”
Do you know how the agility of your employees is doing?
The LEANmeter gives insight in how Lean you are already working. You see your strong points and get advice for improvement, individually and as a team.
Complete the LEANmeter and get the right impulse, it only takes 5 minutes of your time.
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