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How Employees Are Your Greatest Asset in Building Loyal Customers
| Guest post by: Leanne Hoagland-Smith |
Article Overview: Do you believe that you cannot be the Southwest Airlines of your industry when it comes to building loyal customers? Read how one local retail store in a rather unglamorous and highly competitive industry has not let that belief stop them from becoming successful.
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How Employees Are Your Greatest Asset in Building Loyal Customers
In the book Good to Great, Tom Peters talks about having the right people in the right seats in the bus. To have a high performance organization where the gears (employees) are moving in synchronous harmony is the desire of many companies.
Additionally, retention and development of human capital talent are part of the equation to build customer loyalty. Ferdinand Peich realized the importance of employees as a primary competitive strategy when he said: "if you fire people, you fire customers."
Maybe that is part of the reason for Toyota's recent decision to retain and not fire existing employees. The other part was rehiring and retraining was more expensive than retaining. With the economy slowing, this proactive response was truly innovative.
To create a high performance culture, it must be reflected on those pesky financials that are read each week, month and year. Somewhere, human capital talent must be shown as an investment and not a liability. The first step would be having a Chief People Officer sitting at the senior executive and management team with the Chief Financial Officer, the Chief Technology Officer, the Chief Operations Officer and The Chief Executive Officer.
The failure to efficiently and effectively manage internal customers will probably be the quickest way for any company to find itself lagging far behind their competition. As goes the rule, those who truly wish to stay ahead of their competitors will do what they have never done before because they understand that the world is in a state of constant change now more than ever before.
Nationally, companies like Southwest Airlines set the example for maximizing their employees or their internal customers. Southwest Airlines continues to thrive in an industry where others are just surviving.
When many national to local Northwest Indiana companies are ignoring their greatest asset, Family Express of Valparaiso, IN understands the importance and value their employees bring to the bottom line. At Family Express, each new hire goes through an internal Family Express learning and development university.
Gus Olympidis, CEO, also understands that employees are responsible for those moments of truth (interactions between internal customers and external paying customers) that help to create customer loyalty. In a recent press release, Olympidis said "Family Express is about 'building relationships' with our customers."
Without highly trained and developed employees, building relationships becomes an arduous task and ultimately drains the bottom line. By investing up front, this company is saving fixed costs, increasing sales and improving profitability. His actions reaffirm the importance of human capital talent development and management.
So if you think that your firm is too small or is not "prestigious" enough such as Southwest Airlines, then look Family Express, a regional fuel and convenience store, where exceeding the customers' needs are first and foremost. All you are required to do is to change the way you think about your greatest asset – your employees.
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About the Author: Leanne Hoagland-Smith RSS for Leanne's articles - Visit Leanne's website Her book, Be the Red Jacket is a no-nonsense and quick read to help discover potential gaps that may be keeping you from your goal to increase sales. The forward is by Evan Carmichael of EvanCarmichael.com Remember if you think you cannot or you think you can either way you are right. (Henry Ford). Sales Coaching Tip: Change your thoughts; improve your results. Click here to visit Leanne's website   Leadership Audit For Business Business Building Check List Leadership Assessment |
Related Forum Posts
LEADERS
- L- Loyal
E- Eager to learn and serve
A- Active
D- Delegate
E- Efficient
R- Reliable
S- Smart
Type of business with building
- If you owned a building and Wal-Mart was opening its doors across the street in a previously unoccupied area (along with 12-14 small shops), what type of business would you start?
Here are the considerations:
1. Money is a non-factor
2. Building is fairly large (10,000) square feet
3. Building is on the corner of a busy intersection (about to get much busier)
Re: Two Useful Books To Help You Focus On The CLIENT
- Hi David,
To add to your thread, I'd like to recommend Jonathan Tisch's "Chocolates On The Pillow Aren't Enough: Reinventing The Customer Experience".
Tisch's book includes content on "Welcoming Customers", "The New Art of Customization", "The Challenges of Customer Diversity" and "Offering Something Extra to Your Customers" to name a few.
$1,000,000
- Hi Evan,
Are you talking about US Dollars? If so, that would be approx £500,000 in the UK.
The Canadian Dollars differs also from the Australian Dollar.
In any case, one needs to solve problems to help people to get money.
The more solutions are given to people's needs to solve their problems, the closer one gets.
Finally, are we talking about 'Income' or can we talk about 'Asset'?
Kindest Regards
Beat
"Unlock People's Potentials!"
Re: Ways to Boost Productivity
- 1. Give Employees More Than a Paycheck
2. Provide Better eSupport Channels to Promote Self-Service
3. Complete your most dreaded tasks first thing in the morning.
4. Outsource as much as possible
5. . Turn off the TV.
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