I can think of many reasons to celebrate this week…ok, so those of you who are familiar with my sunny demeanour will know that I don’t need much of an excuse to raise a glass.
October is breast cancer awareness month – time for fundraising and donations and to dig out our ‘pink’ pants (US version) to honor of the one in nine women who will fight breast cancer at some point in their lives.
Today is John Lennon’s birthday – the man who as a performer, writer, or co-writer is responsible for 27 number one singles and who, as part of the Beatles, won 7 grammys and 15 Ivor Novella awards (Yes, I am Liverpudlian. And yes I am a massive Beatles fan so I could go on…)
This week is also National Customer Service week. Now in its 18th year, this is time that many companies around the world will use to honor individuals and companies who go beyond the call of duty to champion extraordinary customer service and support. Hopefully companies (including you, American Airlines) will also take advantage of this week to reflect on and/or rethink your approach to your customers’ experience. This was certainly front of mind for those contact center folks I met at CCExpo a few weeks ago – How can they focus on their customers’ experience when their own is so bad, littered with a myriad of desktop applications to respond to even the most basic requests? Sheesh…
On Tuesday, industry giant Forrester Research published a landmark piece of research on the value of extending business process management to customer service in which both Sword Ciboodle and Standard Bank South Africa, one of our clients, feature. After almost 18 months of silence on the topic (wasn’t their last publication the process centric customer service tech wave in which we were leaders??!!), this is indicative of their belief that CRM and BPM are on emergent paths as well as their renewed commitment to educating their end users on this market segment. Yes, a process approach can drive down cost. Yes, a process approach puts customer goals and outcomes at the heart of the customer experience you design. Our existing clients ‘get it’. We ‘got it’ long ago – back in 2006 when we re-branded and launched Ciboodle – nice of Forrester to (re)join our party!
So as the weekend rapidly approaches, cheers to you all… (and mine’s a gin and tonic if you are asking).