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I mostly stand astounded at the level of service delivery and integrity from companies I deal with on a personal and professional level. Some leave the impression that they don't want or need your business. Top brand companies that used to be well known for the top class service now deliver poor service, staff are not well-trained and in some cases aren't even well-mannered. This based on South African companies.
Yes it is just because of the incompetent resource induction in the organization. Organization wanted to pay less and earn more that is why things are getting worse.
dear erika,
i believe from personal experience that what we see and hear about customer service is really theoritical,it is very much over rated.customer satissfaction is a goal that is un achievable due to human nature of wanting more and more and companies are not willing to add that cost to their operational costs.
how much can you really satisfy a customer without adding a substantial cost to your operation.there are accepted practices and parameters,but i think you can never satisfy a human being100%.
i belive if you obide by accepted industry standards you will be rated as acceptable.
in sales we used to use the term exceptional customer service as a sales pitch.how many times did the company delivered excellence, i would say 60%.
usually when companies achieve targets or exceed them, they really become less worried about delivering excellence,they believe customers need them.especially they become dominant in their market.
Yes the trend is changing fast as the population of business opportunities are abundant.
Two mantras: Short term goals and diversify into another short term goal.
Generally speaking, the answer is YES.
Thing is, all over the globe, markets are significantly tougher. There is competition coming in on all levels, not least due to various disparities in the global market place. This leads companies to cut curners to save money, and move more towards a kind of aggressive sales where focus is to win a deal, but not a customer. There is no focus on value, but only on cost.
This sort of market place is really precarious. It is war on attrition, and there are no winners. Vendors loose. Customers loose. Nobody wins.
And worst of all, it is hard to earn status of being "value adding supplier", if one has been branded as "commodity supplier".This can dent supplier's profile and brand-image for years to come, and is very expensive to repair.
Key game changers remain at the top of the food chain for each market, and how they perceive strategic directions in procurement/acquisitions: i.e. should these be cost or value driven. They decide the name of the game.
This is not true for all companies. Let me talk about construction industry, the multinational or big contractors and a good recruiting and hiring policies and don’t compromise on quality. But the contractors don’t have such policies or systems really lose in quality
@Amer - thanks for the theoretical and statistical response. :) I am more aimed at what happens in practice. Some companies do not live up to to their advertised values and also don't do much to improve customer relations by getting back to their former high level of service. E.g. a well-known clothing/food retailer used to have a high level of service. At most of the stores the staff in a particular section e.g. clothing doensn't know their section or even what you are looking for when asking for a specific item. One greeted me 'Yo'. :)
A client will go to their store of choice to buy what they want - sometimes it is a mission just to get the product. It is about integrity, doing proper stock-take so that items don't run out and also have a professional approach to their customers. :)
@Sally - this also seems to be the case in other industries as well. Then the question is raised at the level of training or a short curriculum in order to supply demand.
I read a saying "If you think training is expensive - try ignorance!" :)
We live in the customers' age. Whoever fails to win and retain customers will leave the race.
On the other hand, deteriration in service/product turnarround time will result in higher costs which will erode thinning margines and no one can afford that in competitive markets.
Companies suffering from such issues will become history if they don't attend to the problems and resolve them ASAP.
I think today companies are under tremendous pressure to grab the market in today's highly competitive market scenario. Global free trade to blame! This free trade has opened up abundant opportunities as well as cut-throat competition! A product made in US available with same feature in other part of the globe at throw away price....This makes large established companies to bring down their selling price. They can only look for sourcing these products or part of the product from low cost countries with Tier2 or Tier3 level companies start making these parts. Many times this may end up till Tier5 levels!! This really puts pressure on delivery lead time and company in the bottom of the supply chain has very less lead time to make products. They dont have time to spend in thinking on established product development process, rather, product development happens with quick turnaround! Such scenarios cannot bring out best in class products/services.
Highly volatile market always pushes companies to look for Quick wins!!
This could be the reason why we are seeing drop in product quality / service level of companies and chain of companies spread across the globe leading to quite a longer lead time. More money being wasted in managing logistics!
Yes... Most companies hire junior staff in offshore call centers without proper training and with poor skills to reduce the cost, and usually that job has a high turnover tendency, end result, client suffer.
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