Customer Connections
I was exchanging emails with an executive from CARFAX not too long ago and he told me about an interesting program they have called “customer connections.” The program is pretty simple and its goals are even simpler: expose all types of employees to customers and to what the company is doing. It seems like a great culture builder and an interesting program for any type of company.
The way it works is that every employee, from the “receptionist to the President,” is required to have a certain number of customer connection hours every quarter. The hours are determined by the job title and position. Some people need more hours than others. For example, a software engineer (who usually doesn’t interact with customers) might need to have more customer connection hours than a customer support representative whose job it is to interact with customers every single day.
How employees can get hours is really interesting. They can attend consumer focus groups, listen in on phone calls with dealers or customers, visit dealers, work with staff as they answer consumer emails, attend a session with an industry guest speaker, etc. The point is to get that particular employee to step outside of their normal job and their normal element. It lets employees learn about who the “real” customers are, what challenges they’re facing, and how those challenges affect the rest of the company.
Some companies have programs like this, others don’t. I like this program because it’s more flexible than a lot of other ones. When companies have these sorts of programs, they are usually really rigid (”all employees must spend two hours answering support tickets every year). Even worse, a lot of these programs are ignored or brushed aside. Employees get caught up in other things and when things get busy, companies that aren’t serious about these programs brush them aside.
Furthermore, when there are more options available, it seems like less of a chore. You can do something different every quarter or you can keep doing the same thing - whatever works for you. Many educational institutions (secondary and upper level) require that students have a certain number of community service or school service hours to graduate. The programs there are very similar; students can get community or school service hours doing a number of different things and they have to have a certain amount to graduate. The best thing, though, is that the programs aren’t brushed aside. Students have to have the hours in order to graduate. No exceptions.
