Choosing Where to Invest In Customer Experience Innovation: The Art of Tradeoffs
When asked if customers would like to have more exciting products, faster delivery, lower prices, OR friendlier service, the answer is always YES. The challenge of customer experience excellence isn’t whether to improve products, people, process, or technology. The challenge is to identify which product, process or technology improvement will produce the greatest benefits for…
What are Your UICs? Lessons from American & United Airlines Customer Experience Debacles
I call them UICs (unique industry challenges) and I see them as foundational issues that must be overcome to deliver outstanding customer experiences. Recently, high profile incidents at American Airlines (a confrontation between a flight attendant and a mother with two children as well as another passenger overheard the flight attendant’s behavior concerning the mother’s…
A Contrarian View on the United Airlines Customer Nightmare (We all have a role to play)
I was going to write a blog about all the missteps involved in the United Airlines customer experience disaster. Then I started seeing an “abundance of critics” rushing out of the woodworks – some of whom clearly have never tried to help a company strike a balance between customer needs and profitability. With all this…
Back with an Apology: Rare Rewards of Service Professionalism
I’ve often made a distinction between service and servitude. Sadly, and all too often, customers treat service providers like they are lesser beings. At the same time, I am disheartened when service providers take little pride in developing the skills necessary to be true service professionals. It is my belief that automation will replace many…