perception | Human-Centered Change and Innovation

Difference Between Customer Experience Perception and Reality

GUEST POST from Shep Hyken

This is an important topic that every CEO, business owner, leader, manager, and supervisor must understand. When it comes to customer service and customer experience (CX), there is a difference between perception and reality.

First, how we think our customers perceive our customer service and CX is often not the reality. It’s just our perception. Reality isn’t what we think or believe. It’s what our customers say. Often, there is a big difference between our perception and the reality of our customers’ experiences.

Some may be saying, “Shep, you’ve covered this before.” Yes, however, it is worth covering again, especially since my friend Stephen Van Belleghem released his excellent book, A Diamond In the Rough, where he quotes a Bain survey finding that “80% of CEOs think their company is customer-centric, but only 8% of customers agree.”

One of my LinkedIn followers, Rajat Chawla, read my Forbes article about Van Belleghem’s book and asked, “What’s your best advice to bridge the gap?” As I always promise, if you reach out to me on any social channel and ask a question, I’ll answer it there or in my newsletter, videos, podcast, or on my TV show, Be Amazing or Go Home. So, here’s my answer:

There are at least three strategies for narrowing the gap between these perceptions:

Leaders need to pay attention to their data. After they do a self-assessment, which is their perception, they should – if they haven’t already – survey their customers to discover their reality. That’s the most accurate way to measure the difference.
Leaders should “mystery shop” their companies themselves. They should learn firsthand what it’s like to be a customer. They should be looking for the experiences their customers receive during peak hours or in the middle of the night, what a sales call is like compared to a customer service call, and more.
Finally, leaders should spend time on the front line, either shadowing (listening in) on customer support calls or taking the calls themselves. I addressed spending time on the front line in my first book, Moments of Magic when I covered the All Aboard program in which executives spent one day each quarter with a salesperson visiting customers. In my most recent book, I’ll Be Back, I wrote about how Bill Gates visited the customer support center and asked to take customer support calls. The power of spending time on the front line is undisputed! Experiencing firsthand comments from customers is a powerful dose of reality – hopefully, good reality!

Customer Experience Reality Cartoon

What I love about these three strategies is that other than a little time and effort, there is little or no expense to implement them. So, what are you waiting for? If you haven’t already done so, discover the difference between your perceptions and your customers’ reality. And my wish for you is that there is little or no difference between the two!

Image Credits: Unsplash

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The Secrets of Seeing What's Missing

GUEST POST from Mike Shipulski

With one eye open and the other closed, you have no depth perception. With two eyes open, you see in three dimensions. This ability to see in three dimensions is possible because each eye sees from a unique perspective. The brain knits together the two unique perspectives so you can see the world as it is. Or, as your brain thinks it is, at least.

And the same can be said for an organization. When everyone sees things from a single perspective, the organization has no depth perception. But with at least two perspectives, the organization can better see things as they are. The problem is we’re not taught to see from unique perspectives.

With most presentations, the material is delivered from a single perspective with the intention of helping everyone see from that singular perspective. Because there’s no depth to the presentation, it looks the same whether you look at it with one eye or two. But with some training, you can learn how to see depth even when it has purposely been scraped away.

And it’s the same with reports, proposals, and plans. They are usually written from a single perspective with the objective of helping everyone reach a single conclusion. But with some practice, you can learn to see what’s missing to better see things as they are.

When you see what’s missing, you see things in stereo vision.

Here are some tips to help you see what’s missing. Try them out next time you watch a presentation or read a report, proposal, or plan.

When you see a WHAT, look for the missing WHY on the top and HOW on the bottom. Often, at least one slice of bread is missing from the why-what-how sandwich.

When you see a HOW, look for the missing WHO and WHEN. Usually, the bread or meat is missing from the how-who-when sandwich.

Here’s a rule to live by: Without finishing there can be no starting.

When you see a long list of new projects, tasks, or initiatives that will start next year, look for the missing list of activities that would have to stop in order for the new ones to start.

When you see lots of starting, you’ll see a lot of missing finishing.

When you see a proposal to demonstrate something for the first time or an initial pilot, look for the missing resources for the “then what” work. After the prototype is successful, then what? After the pilot is successful, then what? Look for the missing “then what” resources needed to scale the work. It won’t be there.

When you see a plan that requires new capabilities, look for the missing training plan that must be completed before the new work can be done well. And look for the missing budget that won’t be used to pay for the training plan that won’t happen.

When you see an increased output from a system, look for the missing investment needed to make it happen, the missing lead time to get approval for the missing investment, and the missing lead time to put things in place in time to achieve the increased output that won’t be realized.

When you see a completion date, look for the missing breakdown of the work content that wasn’t used to arbitrarily set the completion date that won’t be met.

When you see a cost reduction goal, look for the missing resources that won’t be freed up from other projects to do the cost reduction work that won’t get done.

It’s difficult to see what’s missing. I hope you find these tips helpful.

Image credit: Pixabay

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