Leadership needed. Loyal customers wanted

Posted on January 25, 2015 by Ken Ingram, One of Thousands of Business Coaches on Noomii.

How would you like to go from an average business to become an awesome business? Perhaps a better question would be, what would you like your external and internal clients to say about you? Since the focus of every business should be to serve both of these important clients what can you do to create the ideal customer experience?
In the book ‘The Customer Comes Second’ by Hal F Rosenbluth he talks about the secret of his company’s success. He made the decision to put his internal customers first (his employees) and in doing so was able to achieve 7,500 % growth within 15 years. This begs the question; can your business create a similar result and what would the process look like?
Just to be clear the answer is yes but it will require that you encourage and develop your employees. This will not be an easy process because it involves time, energy, and a commitment. It requires that you become focused on what matters to your staff and this should spill over into what matter for the customer. When you create the right customer experience your clients reward you with their loyally and sing your praises. In doing so, they help you to attract more clients. When you create the right employee experience they also reward you with their loyalty and in addition help you to increase your revenues.
Maybe Rosenbluth is on to something because most business owners are putting too much emphasis on treating the external customer well and not enough attention on the needs of the internal customer. It would appear that we are a world built upside down since one of our two most challenging issues remains unsolved.
• How can we have enough clients to have sustainable revenues
• How can we find and inspire the right employees?
When you think about has time stood still? How is it that the two biggest concerns we have as business owners still exists and why have we not been able to find the solution?. Is it because we look for the wrong types of clients and maybe we also fail to attract employees with self leadership? The types of employees who have built in “RADAR”. Those who take Responsibility for their choices, are Aware of the need to change, embrace Development as way to become more valuable, are Accountable and take ownership and believe in Results because at the end of the day this is still the only way we can validate our success.
Adopting a leadership style that is centered on treating employees as a valuable resource will be the future critical success factor key because satisfying the needs of the internal customer will be just as important, and in some cases, more important than the external customer.
 
Here are the five things that you can start doing:
1. Identify and clarify the needs of the managers, the employees and the customers.
2. Set Goals to address the expectations of each group
3. Develop a 12 month action plan.
4. Remember that winners keep score so track and measure your progress.
5. At the end of the year evaluate the results and celebrate the successes.

On your journey to increased profitability your attitude toward people and how you view them will make a significant difference in the type of relationship you develop. So begin to view employees as people wanting to do a great job. Tap into their under used potential. Let them know you believe in them. Follow-up with them bi-weekly to ensure that you are meeting their needs and address concerns in a timely matter.

In the end it is up to you but what if all businesses have been focusing on the wrong customer? What if a change in your Leadership style resulted in a 7,500 % increase in growth in 15 years? What if the answer has been obvious and we simply have not made the right choice.

Make the vision of change come alive in your organization.