Students as Customers Providing a customer focused approach to our service

“Customer care in the UK is, at best, mediocre". Survey Lab report into UK service 2008 Organisations have got away with it because so few excel at service delivery and consumers have little incentive to defect – but there is real opportunity for the development of a customer- focused ‘competitive edge’

Customer satisfaction continuum 010 Poor 0-7 Good

Hope is not a strategy!

1. Create a service culture 2. Know your customer 3. Empower and skill the team to deliver service 4. Prioritise Service Measures

1. Create a service culture

“The single purpose of a business is to seek better ways to serve its customers” Steve Jobs

Bring it to life  Customer Service is a leadership and management competence  Talk about service every day – it is the focus of how we do business  Nothing changes unless it improves the customer experience  Identify and embed great service behaviours  Measure and reward service excellence

Is excellent customer service a strategic focus or an operational activity? Is customer focus part of your leadership and management competencies? How do you bring customer service to life everyday? Do you recognise and reward great service? Challenge 1

2. Know your customer Know what they want and how they want it!

The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sells itself. Peter Drucker

What is great service?

Challenges and barriers  Work pressures and competing activities  Financial pressures  It’s not all about competition and rankings  Demand outweighs supply - Capacity constraints within HE sport  There are significant capacity constraints in many institutions, based on availability of a workforce and facilities.  Breadth of provision meeting diversity in student population

Capacity restraints A recent Sport England-led HE audit demonstrated that:  There are insufficient coaches, volunteers and coordinators to increase and sustain student participation  73% of universities do not have sports facilities on all their sites  91% of sports halls are at capacity during term time  88% of universities are already using external facilities for sport.

So why choose you?  Price  Location  Accessibility/opening times  Range of provision  Quality of equipment/coaching  Knowledge & expertise  Like minded clients

Product and price makes you a player Service wins you the game

Customer types Controller Thinker Entertainer Feeler

So how do you build a fitness facility that keeps the rugby team happy?

Challenge 2 Do you really know what your customers want from you? Can we and do we adapt to meet the customer’s needs – what are you doing differently in the new environment? What are you telling your customers you do?

3. Empower and skill the team to deliver world class service Service is more about people than process

Develop the skills to deliver great service  Empower your team to deliver outstanding service  Coach and develop your people to deliver service  Standards and processes never replace doing the right thing for the customer  What are you busy doing if it isn’t doing anything for your customer?  Go the extra inch!

Heads up or Heads Down?

Challenge 3 How do you develop customer service skills and team focus? How do you engage all staff in the importance of excellent service delivery? Do you really empower your team to act upon customer service requirements? What heads up ideas have your team brought to the table recently?

4. Measure and monitor service delivery ……what gets measured gets done!

Retail is detail and the detail is in the numbers ……What gets measured gets done!

What Customer Service measures are in place and how often do you review them? How, when and where do you measure customer service? Does everyone have a service measure? How do you reward great service? Challenge 4

Summary  Retail’s strategic focus is to develop customer loyalty  Great retailers really know what their customers want and make sure they deliver it every time  Excellent service is talked about, reviewed and monitored on a daily basis  Customer service is a competence that is developed at all levels  If your team don’t want to go the extra mile for the customer what are they doing in service?

Summary of your challenges 1. Is excellent customer service a strategic focus or an operational activity? 2. Do you really know what your customers want from you? 3. How do you develop customer service skills and team focus? 4. What Customer Service measures are in place and how often do you review them?