When a business grows weird things can happen – resulting in going from great to good (or worse). Sub units are formed, managing layers are added, functions created, and much more. From a customer perspective, getting the right tool or a problem solved at Andy’s Hardware is a different thing than getting the same thing done at Home Depot. The same is true in the industry I work in – banking. Again, getting a car loan at Randolph Brooks Federal Credit Union is a different experience than getting it from a bank like Chase or Citi.
In my journey to better enable large businesses to get dramatically better at doing what the customer needs – when large becomes complex – I have been doing a bit of business research. The core philosophy I find useful is the Service Profit Chain. One of the key tools to have in the solution toolkit is the Servqual model, which uses survey techniques based on target question areas.
However, I had yet to find a way to get the tools into the hands of the people that needed it the most – the associates providing solutions to customers or trying to manage service recovery… until…
As a Six Sigma Master Black Belt, I have learned how to apply statistical approaches to revenue and service improvements on what I consider to be a “slice of the whole story” scale. Without advanced models to model of the system of customer experience interactions at a bank like Bank of America or HSBC or a company like Home Depot, it’s tough to make the information gathered useful and relevant to driving revenue and improve profits. This complexity increases with the Rubik’s cube of multiple-channels, multiple-segments, and multiple-products.
WhyData’s value proposition is both simple and difficult to explain. Pete Gray, their CEO, has explained they have an analytical approach and software black box that allow you to look at the range of customer experience data (from lagging to leading) and transform that into views that allow associates to pinpoint where improvements are needed, for a business to predict – based on indicator metrics – what the customer experience will be, and for stakeholders to see increased profitability from improved customer retention and cost-optimized service delivery.
The solution they are building has several self-assessment and coaching tools that distinguish their approach. Just like a forecasting tool, the usefulness of the tools improve with over-time information (trend data) and tighter activity-based profit modeling. The solution is not right for single channel, single product businesses but should be considered when the Rubik moves from a few blocks within the cube to many.
So I have added Pete and his team to my “I really need help in fixing a bad customer experience” contact list.
