The C-suite is on a service rampage!
Fortunately, corporate executives are realizing that sustained business success requires differentiated, consistent, emotionally engaging customer experiences. According to Forrester research, 92 percent of executive teams have defined “customer experience elevation” as a key strategic priority.
Unfortunately, these same executives look primarily to HR and Training departments to develop a workforce capable of driving customer loyalty and referrals. The problem is that these departments alone cannot create a service-driven mindset; it must flow from the top and be organically integrated into every aspect of the company’s culture. Even more unfortunately, customers are reporting satisfaction levels approaching a nine-year low on the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI)—and satisfaction is just a “table stake” when it comes to driving full customer engagement.
Yet there is some good news. Amid this challenging backdrop, many brands and leaders are successfully transforming corporate culture and deploying training tools that drive loyalty and sustained profitability. One such example is a brand I have worked with for more than three years—Mercedes-Benz USA (MBUSA).
While Mercedes-Benz is known for automotive engineering, marketing prowess, and being an employer of choice, in previous years it had not been known for consistent and engaging experiences in its more than 370 dealerships across the United States.
From the CEO on down, leaders at MBUSA have committed to and invested in a multi-year journey with a heavy emphasis on shifting the culture from product-based (Mercedes-Benz vehicles) to customer-obsession. I offer a detailed account of this transformation and tools for leaders in my book, “Driven to Delight: Delivering World-Class Customer Experience the Mercedes-Benz Way,” but for our purpose here, I’ll give an overview of one enterprise-wide and recurrent customer experience training program titled Driven to LEAD (LEAD is an acronym for Listen, Empathize, Add Value, and Delight).
Prior to developing Driven to LEAD, staff members at MBUSA interviewed 10 percent of the Mercedes-Benz dealer principals in the U.S. and sent surveys to 3,000 of the employees in those dealerships to gather insights and perceptions about the quality of customer experiences. Feedback from those employees informed training development prior to the inaugural Driven to LEAD rollout. MBUSA training staff (with the assistance of outside resources) produced content, conducted a pilot phase, trained trainers, and delivered Driven to LEAD over 83 training dates in a 23-city tour. In total, 15 people were involved in Driven to LEAD development and 20 additional trainers participated in breakout sessions.
From a content perspective, Driven to LEAD training amplified the challenges and opportunities Mercedes-Benz faced in the luxury customer experience arena and was founded on three pillars:
- Awareness: The realization that what a service professional thinks is good enough may not be memorable to the customer.
- Perspective: Some 365 days per year, customers are having great experiences with one brand or another. Does the experience being delivered to the customers at Mercedes-Benz dealerships measure up to the best of the best?
- Personal, Team, and Leader Commitments: Participants were tasked with taking the training content and making action based commitments to transform their workplace in the days and weeks ahead.
As an example of awareness and perspective-building components, Driven to LEAD trainers asked participants to imagine a customer coming into a Nordstrom store declaring he or she had $75,000 to spend. The trainer would go on to ask, “What do you think the staff and leadership at Nordstrom would do in that situation?” Ultimately, the trainer would point out how Mercedes-Benz customers were entering dealerships with a very similar mission. The trainer also would ask how experiences in the dealership could match those of Nordstrom customers.
While this example was posed to dealership staff in the context of a car-buying experience, it is an equally applicable challenge across all industries. How enriched an experience would the “best of the best” customer-centric businesses offer to a customer who is eager to buy their products?
In addition to the daylong offsite training involved in the launch of Driven to LEAD, the impact of the educational events was extended through a dealer-facing training Website, supporting videos, and a customer delight story contest at the dealership level.
As part of Driven to LEAD, participants were asked to sign a written commitment card pledging to Listen, Empathize, Add Value, and Delight those they serve. This step of formalizing the training commitment should not be overlooked. There have been widespread research studies dating back to the 1950s looking at the power of “commitment contracts.” While results vary from study to study, the act of formalizing a commitment in writing consistently has been shown to have a substantial likelihood of increased follow-through with a pledge. Since people seek to be internally consistent, the act of formalizing and publishing a commitment increases the probability they will do what they publically have said they would. If our public commitments are refreshed on a regular basis, our compliance tends to increase further.
In addition to securing written commitment cards, participants of the Driven to LEAD program also completed a “What’s Holding You Back (WHYB)” form, which allowed them to actively challenge both personal and organizational barriers to delivering consistent customer delight. Participants were asked to look at the conversations that were occurring inside their own heads; particularly those that could get in the way of making progress on cultural transformation and customer delight. These conversations often sound like: “We have tried this before,” “This will never work,” “This is going to inconvenience me.” Participants also were asked to identify other factors across Mercedes-Benz that might derail customer-centric change. These issues might include “too much change occurring too quickly, “ineffective change leadership,” “poor communication systems,” or “low team morale.”
Information collected on the WHYB form was used to create action plans, and thousands of feedback points were captured from dealer attendees. A Mercedes-Benz project manager categorized and tracked every action plan that was generated. Those action plans were shared with the dealer network so they could measure progress. When participants suggested that the actions of Mercedes-Benz USA were limiting their ability to serve customers, that feedback was pushed out to senior leaders across MBUSA/MBFS and the results were shared with the dealers.
Jumpstart kits and additional video tools were provided for use at the dealership. Additionally, a Driven to LEAD e-learning curriculum was made available. Driven to LEAD has undergone multiple iterations since launch and has become deeply interwoven into the fabric of the Mercedes-Benz culture, starting with new employee orientation all the way through advanced brand immersion experience. All of this serves to create an enterprise-wide understanding concerning the “why, what, and how” involved in being “DRIVEN TO DELIGHT.”
Here’s the point: Training was a critical aspect of the MBUSA cultural transformation. Yet it was not “pasted on” or “dictated” to employees as too many training initiatives are. Rather, it was thoughtfully developed and deployed as part of a dynamic and ongoing conversation with those who actually create the customer experience. Clearly, MBUSA gets how powerful, and meaningful, training can be. All companies can learn and grow from its experience.
Excerpt from “Driven to Delight: Delivering World-Class Customer Experience the Mercedes-Benz Way” by Joseph Michelli.
Joseph A Michelli, Ph.D., CSP, is a speaker, consultant, and New York Times No. 1 best-selling author. For more information, visit http://www.josephmichelli.com.
