Dealing with Challenges in Creating a Customer-Centric Culture

A “customer-centric culture” ensures the happiness of employees who then transfer their brand feeling to consumers through experiences.

In our 2014 Integrity in Selling Study, we asked 300 business and development leaders from a cross-section of industries what they saw as challenges to creating and sustaining a customer-centric culture. The issues they reported included:

• Finding new ways to connect with customers and accelerate service delivery.
• Providing consistency across channels.
• Overcoming employee complacency.
• Time and cross-training.
• Consistent, effective coaching.
• Consistent message and training on sales.

A “customer-centric culture” ensures the happiness of employees who then transfer their brand feeling to consumers through experiences.   Sam Stern, senior analyst at Forrester Research, says, “Companies aspire to focus on consumers, but reality often gets in the way.” When employees see that their brand is not just a product or service, but an authentic human connection, the light bulb goes off. A brand is better than its products, and it is driven by individuals who want to delivery a high value experience.

Forrester’s data shows that 75 percent of engaged employees feel that they are able to produce a great experience for consumers, while only 17 percent of disengaged employees felt the same.

To change culture, a full support of the brand executives is needed. It is the most important step in creating a customer-centric culture. Then training and coaching can be established to build the customer experience transformation.