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Posted on Aug 2, 2011

Is Customer-Focus an oxymoron?

Why state the obvious? Aren’t all organizations focused on its customers? Yet, there are more stories than one can count describing an experience where clearly the customer was not important. In fact, the experience left the customer feeling like they were more of a problem instead of being appreciated.

Many organizations include some form of the concept of ‘Customer-Focus’ on their list of core Values, including:

Very nice. But is it a competitive differentiator? Or is it just an oxymoron? Should it even be listed as a core Value?

Consider Southwest Airlines. When compared to other airlines, they consistently rank near the top – if not at the top – as a customer-focused organization. Yet if you carefully read their Mission statement, the focus is really on their employees. If employees feel the love, they in turn give the love (which they refer to as ‘LUV’). There are lots of books, articles, blogs and more that reference the distinctive culture – and strong core values – of this well-respected company. Once such article by HBR succinctly captures the essence of Southwest’s focus on employees, highlighting a key benefit of low employee turnover. The secrets of Southwest’s success are highlighted in the book “The Southwest Airlines Way: Using the Power of Relationships to Achieve High Performance” (2005) by Jody Hoffer Gittell. Here, Gittell suggests that the key ingredient to Southwest’s success is its ability to build and sustain high performance relationships among managers, employees, unions, and suppliers.

So is Southwest Airlines ‘customer-focused?’ Not really. Their people are.

Why is it then difficult for so many organizations to be customer-focused? Permit me to share a personal experience.

I once asked a Director of Marketing, who was my client at a fortune 500 company: “how much of your time do you spend managing up?” I had noticed that they were constantly in meetings with other executives trying to sell their ideas, persuade management to provide the resources necessary to achieve their objectives, compete with others for resources, and battle those who would like to see them fail. It was a very political environment. This Director’s response to me was very telling when they replied “85% of my time.”

So I then asked this marketing director:

“With you that busy managing up, who is focused on understanding the needs of the customer?”

Their reply:

“That’s why you [the agency] are here.”

This organization was not customer-focused. And it showed in their financial results. The irony is that their core values included a statement about being customer-focused. Here, it was an oxymoron.

If employees are investing so much time trying to manage – or battle – the inner workings of the organization, they are clearly not customer focused. Instead, organizations need to be honest with all its stakeholders – customers, employees, shareholders, channel partners, suppliers, and everyone else. It would be better to state a core Value you can keep – such as “we make quality products with the best warranty in the business” – than promise to be Customer-Focused when it is purely wishful thinking.

When’s the last time your organization did an honest assessment of itself? If you want to be customer-focused, then ask your customers how they truly perceive your organization and what they think are your unique differentiators.

Note: This post originally published for Idea Exchange.